LIVESTOCK EXTENSION EDUCATION
Features of livestock
·
Plays an important role in the rural.
·
Additional income to the livestock
farmers.
·
variety of livestock are available for
o
draught power
o
milk
o
meat
o
eggs
o
wool ensures
·
have an intimate relationship with
livelihood particularly in arid and semi-arid areas
·
a major source of supplementary income
for rural households
·
highly livelihood intensive
·
provides sustenance during drought and
other natural calamities to rural families
·
an important pathway for increasing the
income of marginal and small farmers and landless labourers
Concept of Extension
Education
·
James Stuart - father of University
Extension in England in 1867-68
·
The term extension education was first
used by Cambridge University in 1873
·
Land Grant Colleges in the United States
of America formally established the Agricultural Extension work by integrating
different activities of the colleges.
Branches of Extension
Education may include;
·
agriculture extension
·
livestock extension
·
home science extension
·
fisheries extension
Defination
The
word extension is derived from the Latin roots “ex” meaning “out” and “tension”
meaning “stretching”. “Extension education is stretching out to the people who
are beyond the limits of educational institutions”.
The
National Commission on Agriculture (1976) refers to extension as an out of
school education and services for the members of the farm family and others
directly or indirectly engaged in farm production to enable them to adopt
improved practices in production, management, conservation and marketing.
Extension
involves the conscious use of communication of information to help people to
form sound opinions and make good decisions (van den Ban and Hawkins 1996).
Extension
is also defined as a professional communication intervention deployed by an
institution to induce change in voluntary behaviour with a presumed public or
collective activity (Roling, 1988).
These
definitions indicate that extension is for;
i)
extending educational advantages
ii) forming
sound opinions to make good decisions
iii) inducing
changes in voluntary behavior.
The
education is effective when it results in changes in all the following
behavioural components as specified by Paul Leagans:
i)
Knowledge - What an individual knows?
ii)
Attitudes -What he thinks?
iii)
Skills (both Physical & Mental)
-What he can do?
iv)
Action - What he actually does?
Objective of livestock extension
education
·
to empower the farmers with appropriate and
recent technological knowledge and skills
·
to teach people living especially in
rural areas how to raise their standard of living by their own efforts using
their own resources of manpower and materials with the minimum assistance from
Government
·
to help people to solve their own
problems through the application of scientific knowledge
·
to bring desirable changes in the
quality of life of the target group
·
development of livestock farmers
Philosophy
According
to Ensminger, Extension involves
·
changing attitudes, knowledge and skills
of the people.
·
working with men and women, young
people, boys and girls to answer their needs and wants.
·
helping people to help themselves
·
principles of “Learning by doing” and
“Seeing is believing”
·
development of individuals, their leaders,
their society and their world as a whole.
·
working in harmony with the culture of
the people.
·
a two way channel
·
a continuous educational process.
Extension
Educational Process
According
to Leagans the sequence of steps involved in the process are (i) situation
analysis (ii) formulation of objectives (iii) deciding the content and teaching
methods (iv) outcome evaluation and impact analysis and (v) feedback and
formulation of corrective action.
Effective
Teaching Learning Situation
Teaching
in extension education reflects the philosophy of change in knowledge, skills,
attitudes, values, beliefs and understanding.
The
teaching learning process is usually explained with the help of the following
six steps:
Attention:
Bringing
attention of the learner is the first and foremost step in the teaching
learning process.
Interest:
Once
the learners’ attention is focused next responsibility of the teacher is to
arouse the interest in the learner towards the subject matter.
Desire:
Once
the interest is created the teacher has to sustain the interest and stimulate
the learner to convert the interest into desire.
Conviction/ Belief: The action followed when desire,
conviction and satisfaction of the learners is achieved. Therefore, the teacher
should see that the learner knows what action is necessary and just how to take
that action. He also should help the learner to visualize the action in terms
of his own situation and gets confidence in his ability to apply the things by
himself in practice.
Action:
In
this step the conviction is converted into action and the job of the teacher is
to make his student act in the lines of the knowledge acquired. Action means
implementation in the actual situation.
Satisfaction:
The
end product of the teaching effort is the satisfaction that comes to the
learner as a result of solving the problem, meeting a need, acquiring a new
skill or some other change in behaviour. The goals of learning are achieved
through accomplishment of the learner in applying the knowledge and achieving
satisfaction out of the results.
Research
revealed that people learn
·
1 % through taste
·
1.5 % through touch
·
3.5 % through smell
·
11 % through hearing
·
83 % through sight
Dale
Edgar’s (1964) illustrates that people tend to remember
·
10 % of what they read
·
20 % of what they hear
·
30 percent what they see
·
50 percent of what they hear and see
·
70 percent of what they say
·
90 percent of what they say and do
Elements of an
effective learning situation
It
comprises of
·
Teacher
·
Learner
·
Subject matter
·
Teaching materials
·
Physical facilities
Fig 1: The Elements of a Learning Situation
Teacher:
The
teacher plays an important role in arousing the interest of the learner
and sustains it throughout. He should be able to create a congenial learning
situation wherein the learner participates actively in the teaching
process.
Learner:
The
participation of the learner in the teaching process depends upon the extent to
which the subject matter is useful to him and it was communicated in a manner
that he can understand very well. The learner’s ability in learning a subject
depends upon the extent to which his sense organs are involved in the process
of learning.
Subject
Matter: The topics chosen for teaching must address the
needs of the learners which is necessary to sustain the interest of the
learners. It is advisable for the extension professionals to conduct need
analysis to assess and prioritize the areas of interest to the learners.
Teaching
Materials: There are various ways of teaching a
subject matter to the learners. Here too the teacher plays an important role in
selecting appropriate teaching materials or aids which suit to the
subject matter, learners and local situation. But in no case these materials
will substitute a teacher. These are only aids which need to be used
judiciously taking into consideration various factors which include the
characteristics of the learners, availability and cost of aids, familiarity
with the use of aids and subject matter to be delivered.
Physical
Facilities: The place where the subject matter has
to be taught is very important. Depending upon the subject matter and the
characteristics of the learners an appropriate place could be chosen
which preferably should represent a real life situation. The place must be adequate,
easily accessible and a learning atmosphere comparatively free from noise.
He should try to involve as many senses of the learners as possible in
an effective learning process. The extension teacher must bear in mind that the
flow of teaching in extension is horizontal as he also gains from the
livestock owners which is possible by encouraging the livestock owners to
participate actively in the learning process.
Purpose
and Significance of Livestock Extension Education
Livestock
extension involves systematic and organized communication with livestock owners
with a view to helping them in such a way that the livestock owners
·
obtain
a better insight into their present and future position as livestock owners
·
acquire
sufficient knowledge and skills necessary to increase production or reduce cost
of production
·
develop
positive attitudes of livestock development
·
able
to choose feasible and optimum objectives
·
able
to identify problems, look for solutions, solve the problems identified
·
evaluate
the results within the farming system situation in which they are operating
The
subject matter delivered should be directly applicable to the livestock
owners, which is necessary for livestock development. This could be
accomplished by designing the training programme based on needs of the
livestock owners. It is also equally important for the extension agencies
to help the development of leadership among the livestock owners.
Development of appropriate local leaders helps the extension agencies in
several ways. There are no means by which a large number of livestock owners
spread throughout the length and breadth of the country can be forced to
practices animal husbandry in a specific way. Such attempts usually meet with
passive and even at times active form of resistance. The better option could be
is to influence their decision making through livestock extension so that their
decisions will be to their own and to their society’s advantage. Livestock
extension alone is seldom sufficient to increase animal production.
Livestock
extension cannot operate in standalone situation as it needs the support of
various institutions and several groups of people. In addition to livestock
extension, the other elements required for increasing animal production are;
i)
remunerative market
ii)
assured water and electricity supply
iii)
local availability and accessibility of
inputs such as feeds, medicines, vaccines, technical services and equipments
iv)
roads, transportation and storage
facilities
v)
credit supply
vi)
appropriate policy on animal husbandry.
The
domain of knowledge covered by Livestock Extension are;
i)
technical problems such as selection of
livestock, improved breeding, better feeding, housing and management
ii)
farm economics and organizational
problems which include importance of culling of animals, labour management,
labour saving equipments (milking machines, meat processing equipments)
acquisition of credit and its repayment, farm plans etc. How to reduce cost of
production of milk, meat or eggs etc. is forms an important aspect for the
livestock owners. ?
iii)
issues pertaining to globalization and
WTO regulations
The change must be
i)
felt
by the livestock owners as important
ii)
significant
economically and socially to a relatively large number of people
iii)
related
to the primary needs of the society.
People must undergo change
because
i)
it
is the people who must make changes in farming, home-making, health, community
etc. that contribute to development
ii)
change
in people, educationally, is a pre-requisite to the attainment of other
iii)
changes
in a free society
iv)
changes
in the mind (Head) and heart of people precede changes in actions (Hands).
Livestock Situation and
Challenges for Livestock Extension
1.
Millions
of people depend on livestock whether directly or indirectly
2.
Livestock
owners spread throughout the country
3.
Resource
poor livestock farmers contribute a lot to production of milk, meat, egg, wool
etc.
4.
Common
property lands are shrinking leading to increased dependency on purchased
inputs
5.
Majority
of livestock keepers are poor and women
6.
Veterinarian
is the most credible source of information on livestock rearing
7.
The
market for livestock and livestock products is mostly unorganized
8.
Per
capita consumption of milk among the resource poor milk producers is very low
9.
Majority
of the poor own few less productive animals
10. The livestock owners have no
control on quantity and quality of production.
This dynamic livestock situation
is posing several challenges to livestock extension services. Some of the
challenges with which the extension personnel have to cope up with are;
1.
How
to reach millions of livestock owners spread in every nook and corner of the
country especially those who are thriving in Complex, Diverse and Risk prone
(CDR) environment?
2.
How
to improve the living standards of the rural livestock owners through livestock
rearing especially when the pressure on land is increasing and common property
lands are slowly fading out forcing the rural poor to maintain the animals on
purchased fodders?
3.
How
to sustain the production of livestock products with decreasing area under
fodder and increase in the competition for feed resources and decreasing
interests of the people in livestock rearing?
4.
How
to face the emerging livestock development situation as a sequel to the
technological and development interventions?
5.
How
to take cognizance of the changes that are taking place in the society which
include : Shift from farming to industry; Shift from rural to urban (migration
); Shift from grazing to stall feeding; Shift in focus from social to economic
issues.
Target Groups:
Livestock development involves a
number of target groups with whom the extension agents need to work with. These
groups include;
1.
Livestock
owners: All those who own livestock (dairy farmers, sheep and goat keepers,
poultry farmers, etc.)
2.
Livestock
service providers: Animal Husbandry department personnel, Marketing
institutions like Milk Cooperatives, APEDA, Training institutions like KVKs,
NGOs, Research / Academic institutions – Veterinary Universities/ Colleges,
ICAR animal science institutes, Bankers, Insurance agencies etc.
3.
Input
suppliers: Semen banks, feed mixing plants, Pharmaceuticals, vaccine production
units, Livestock product processing units, Fodder seed production units, Agro
related industries etc.
4.
Policy
makers: Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry, Secretaries of AH
organisations, Senior officials of AH Department, Milk Federations,
Researchers, Farmer organisations etc.
