Livestock farmers' awareness, access and benefits of Veterinary Extension Services in Southwestern, Nigeria

O I Oladele

Department of Agricultural Extension and Rural Development, University of Ibadan, Nigeria
Present address: Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences, Tsukuba City, Ibaraki 305-8686, Japan.
oladele@jircas.affrc.go.jp

Abstract

This paper examines the awareness, access, and benefits of livestock farmers on the veterinary extension services provided by the Ministry of Agriculture and the University of Ibadan veterinary clinics in south-western Nigeria. Simple sampling technique was used to select 125 livestock farmers who visited the veterinary clinics and data were collected on variables of the study and subjected to empirical statistical test.

The result shows that farmers are aware of veterinary extension services (82%) and particularly the services provided by the Ministry of Agriculture. The prominent information sources on veterinary services are office call and individual call while the most important benefits derived are management of livestock disease (91%) and treatment of livestock (88%). The result of the multiple regression analysis further showed a significant relationship between the benefits derived and a set of independent variables, with attitude to veterinary services as the most important predictor. The result of Chi- square analysis showed that benefit from veterinary services was significantly related to awareness and access variables. Record of veterinary clinic visited showed a significantly relationship with benefit derived, while non-significant relationships were recorded for source of information , veterinary services received , and awareness of veterinary services.

The implication is that for livestock farmers to maximize the benefit of veterinary extension services the awareness and access issues have to the effectively coordinated.

Keywords: Access, awareness, benefits, Nigeria, veterinary extension services

Introduction

Livestock production is a source of employment and livelihood in Nigerian agriculture. A large percentage of the rural people satisfy their subsistence needs through livestock production which involves the rearing and marketing of livestock. This class of animals includes cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, and poultry. According to Tewe (1997) Nigeria's livestock resources include 13,885,813 cattle, 34,453,724 goats,  22,092,602 sheep, 3,406,381 pigs and 104,247,960 poultry. Traditionally managed stock is over 85% for all species while commercially managed is only significant for poultry at 13.8% and to a lesser extent for pigs at 3.24%. Livestock production management practices vary according to the group of livestock in question. Large and small ruminant production is characterized by two types of management practices; the traditional or range system and the modern ranch or commercial system. The extensive scavenging system, the semi intensive system and intensive (commercialized) systems are the predominant management systems for pig production. The traditional or free range system and the commercialized production which can be by battery cages or deep liter method are the two prevalent management systems in poultry production. Livestock contribution to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has increased from Naira 992.91 million in 1973-74 to N5.684 billion in 1996. However, its percentage contribution to the GDP has not changed dramatically, accounting for only 3.54% of the GDP in 1973-74 and increasing to a mere 3.79 by 1996. It actually suffered a decline in 1995, accounting for only 3.35% of the GDP in that year (National Rolling Plan 1997-1999).

Livestock diseases in Nigeria have seriously influenced the productivity of livestock population. As a result of the devastating outcome of livestock diseases, animal protein output has not been able to meet up with the national demand. Livestock diseases can be infection or non-infectious. Livestock disease can also be communicable; such diseases are easily transmitted from one host to another through direct contact whether by inhalation or body contact. There are also zoonotic livestock diseases which infect both man and animals e.g. anthrax and tuberculosis. (Saibu 1991). The prevention and control of animal diseases is a frequently reoccurring problem at all national and international levels which usually brings about direct action being taken by veterinary services. According to Majiyagbe and Lamide (1997), in Nigeria the loss of livestock exists at a much higher rate than in developed countries and at times such production losses range between 30 and 40% which could be estimated at a minimum of 200 million Naira per annum at 1981 price.

In order to prevent this trend, veterinary services are currently provided in southwestern Nigeria. The services make the farmer aware of livestock management in terms of prevention and control of animal diseases. The outreach clinics are located in different parts where services such as advisory, treatment, control are provided to the livestock farmers. From the foregoing, the study intends to seek answers to the questions of farmers' awareness and contact with contact veterinary centers for services. The objective of the study is to determine the awareness, access and benefits of veterinary services to farmers. Also, significant relationships between awareness of the services and the benefit derived from veterinary services were explored in the paper.

Methodology

The selected area of study is Oyo state in southwestern Nigeria due to the concentration of Ministry and university clinics. It lies between latitude 7.0°N and 9.3°N of the equator and between latitude 2.5°E to 5.0°E of the prime meridian. There are two categories of veterinary clinics in the state; public veterinary clinics and private veterinary clinics. The public veterinary clinics are controlled by the government either at state or local government level while the private ones are controlled by individuals. Also there are some veterinary clinics controlled by University of Ibadan.

The population studies consists of all livestock farmers in Oyo state that have patronized the veterinary clinics. Veterinary outreach clinics by University of Ibadan and Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources are located in 23 stations within Oyo state, with University of Ibadan having 2 stations out of the 23 stations. A list of farmers involved in livestock production was obtained from the veterinary stations (clinics) for the year 2001 from the case file. Out of these 23 stations, 7 stations were randomly selected for the study. Ten percent of the farmers that have patronized the stations were randomly selected and interviewed for the study. Data were collected through interview schedule based on structured questionnaire that is made up of close and open-ended questions on the variables of the study and were subjected to frequency counts, percentages and multiple regression analysis.

Results and Discussion

The farmer's access to veterinary services was high with the majority choosing the Ministry of Agriculture Veterinary clinic (75.2%), and most of them visited the clinic regularly (Table 1).

Office calls (71.2%) were the most prominent source of information to the livestock farmers (Table 2). Others include meetings (60.4 percent), followed by individual call (58.4 percent). The least prominent sources were magazine, newspapers and workshop and field discussions. These sources were less prominent because livestock farmers do not have access to them and the majority of them have a low educational level.

The most notable benefit were treatment of livestock diseases, curing of livestock diseases, then control of livestock diseases and consultancy services to livestock farmers (Table 3). The reason why these benefits are the most prominent may be due to the fact that they are the most needed by the livestock farmers.

There was a strong correlation between the benefit of services received and several independent variables (Table 4).  The most important predictor of the benefit of services received was the attitude to veterinary services by livestock farmers, followed by effectiveness of services and source of information on veterinary services.

Table 4. Multiple Regression Analysis on Benefit of Veterinary Services and some Independent Variables
Model		R		R square		Adjusted R square		Standard Error of the Estimate
		0.73q		0.53		0.46		4.20
ANOVA
Model	Sum of squares		df		Mean square			F		Sig.
Regression	2178		17		128			7.25		0.000
Residual	189		107		17.7
Total	4069		124
Model			Understandardized coefficients				Standardized coefficients
			B		StandardError		Beta		t		Sig.
(Constant)			6.824		3.878				1.760		0.81
Gender			-1.292		0.901		-0.111		-1.434		0.155
Age			4.262E-02		0.040		0.100		1.061		0.291
Marital status			-5.659E-02		0.541		-0.009		-0.105		0.917
Education			0.131		0.346		-0.003		0.377		0.707
Number of children			-0.315		0.193		-0.105		-1.636		0.105
Number of dependant			0.240		0.242		0.094		0.994		0.323
Flock  size			-6.704E-03		0.004		-0.120		-1.571		0.119
Veterinary clinic visited			-0.793		0.529		-0.137		-1.497		0.137
Frequency of contact			-0.191		0.634		-0.024		-.301		0.764
Income			-8.757E-05		0.000		-0.077		-1.076		0.284
Religion			-1.742		0.870		-0.175		-2.002		0.045
Awareness			-0.129		1.274		-0.000		-0.101		0.919
Time of awareness			-0.156		0.089		-0.154		-1.741		0.085
Source of information on veterinary service			0.178		0.051		0.284		3.476		0.001
Attitude to veterinary services			0.265		0.037		0.565		7.164		0.000
Effectiveness of services			0.289		0.072		0.341		4.007		0.000

A significant relationship was recorded between benefits and visits to veterinary clinics (Table 5), while sources of information, veterinary services, and frequency of contact were not significant.

Conclusion

• Most of the respondents agreed that they visited the veterinary clinics regularly.
• The advisory services rendered by veterinary clinics were found to be the most effective service rendered.
• The majority of the livestock farmers' derived high benefit from their management of livestock diseases.

References

National Rolling Plan 1997-1999 Volume 1, Printed by NISER Library Ibadan. pp 74-75.

Majiyagbe K A and Lamide A G 1997 "Livestock Diseases" In: Shaibu B, Adedipe N O, Odegbaro O A and Aliyu A (editors). Towards Strengthening the Nigeria Agricultural Research System, FMNAR, Abuja pp 233-235.

Saibu S N A 1991 Zoonotic Diseases and Their Control: Extension bulletin No 54, Livestock Services No. 14. National Agricultural Extension and Research Liaison Services, Federal Ministry of Science and Technology, Ahmadu Bello University, Nigeria, p1.

Tewe O O 1997 Sustainable and Development: "Paradigms from Nigeria's livestock industry". Inaugural Lecture 1996-1997. Polygraphic Ventures Limited. pp1-6.