| dc.description.abstract | This study was carried out as a partial fulfilment
for the Master of Science in Agricultural Economics during
the University academic year 1974/75. The study is
entitled.The effect of District Farm Institute (DFI )
courses on Improved Farming Practices and Innovations."
Thus the purpose of the research was to compare efforts
made by the DFI with the results from the farmers who have
attended the courses. In order to be able to do this an
attempt was made to look into the following:-
(a) Curriculum development and time of the year
the courses are supposed to be held.
(b) Staffing procedures and teaching facilities.
(c) The criterion and method employed for farmer
selection for DFI courses and how the follow-up
is carried out.
A sample of 56 ex-DFI farmers were visited and interviewed
to find out the extent to which their awareness to
new methods of farming had been increased by attendance of
DFI courses.
An observation was also made to find out what changes
1n practice resulted from having attended a farm institute
course. The ex-DFI farmers were also asked 1n such a way
as to obtain their opinion as to whether their earn1ngs
had increased because of DFI course attendance. In order
to determine whether farmers who have been to DFI are
practicing what they were taught at the DFI a group of
28 farmers who have not had DFI courses were interviewed as
a control group. The study was centred on farmers who have
been to Mukono DFI and living in Mengo District.
The results of the study show a significant benefit
for those farmers who had attended DFI courses. The·study
1. Throughout the thesis, DFI stands for DISTRICT FARM
INSTITUTE
indicates that the rate of adoption has been stepped up
considerably by the training course. It was observed
that the use of modern techniques such as fertilisers,
insecticides and practices such as optimum planting time,
proper spacing, adequate weeding, was significantly
higher among ex-DFI farmers. Most of the ex-DFI farmers
interviewed, indicated that they were planning to make more
changes in the future. It was also noted that there were
many instances of neighbours adopting practices because
of the results obtained by the farmers who attended the
course.
A substantial number of ex-DFI farmers felt that they
had gained both technically by enlarging their technical
knowledge and financially by using the knowledge they had
acquired to increase their earnings by means of an increased
agricultural output.
In the study it was also observed that there are
measures which could be taken by the Uganda Government
in order to increase the effectiveness of DFI courses. These
measures could be on DFI course content, DFI teachers and
their recruitment, recruitment of farmers to DFI courses and
the follow-up.
The study reveals the scope for inducing the technical
knowledge of farmers by means of DFI courses tends to be
constrained by the infrastructure of markets, input supplies,
transport, lack of capital and labour constraints. Measures
to alleviate or remove these constraints would contribute
significantly towards increasing the effectiveness of DFI
courses. In this respect the availability of credits,
creation of new market outlets, improved village road network
system and improved availability and efficient distribution of
inputs would contribute a lot towards the effectiveness of
DFI courses. | en |
