Assessing the level of farmers' participation in the choice of enterprises promoted by NAADS in Arua District, northwestern Uganda

Contracting agricultural extension is one strategy being promoted by World Bank to expand extension coverage and improve performance. In this regard, Uganda is replacing its public extension service delivery with Contract extension services under National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS). NAADS aim at developing demand driven, client oriented and farmer-led agricultural service delivery. However, little is known about contract extension system in the developing world and Uganda in particular. In order to improve on its performance, NAADS needs to build on its experience and lessons learnt as it spreads across the country. The purpose of the present study was to determine the extent to which farmers participated in the choice of enterprises under NAADS and the extent to which NAADS was addressing farmers’ felt needs. A sample of 160 individual farmers from eight sub-counties was randomly selected. Four of the sub-counties were NAADS pilot sub-counties and the other four non-NAADS sub-counties purposively and randomly selected, respectively. The study used questionnaires, checklist and focus group discussion for collecting the data. The results show that 25% and 22.5% of NAADS crop farmers and NAADS goat farmers ranked tobacco as priority crop enterprise for cash. The same crop ranked first among non-NAADS farmers. Goats were ranked as the first priority livestock enterprise by 50% NAADS goat farmers, 45% non-NAADS farmers in NAADS sub-counties and 52.5% non-NAADS farmers outside NAADS sub-counties. NAADS was promoting rice and pigeon pea enterprises which farmers ranked low. The results suggest that there was a mismatch between what NAADS and farmers considered priority enterprises. This may influence farmers’ capacity in the production of these enterprises.