Assessment of Graduating Students Perception on Agricultural production: Case study of Federal Colleges of Agriculture in Oyo State, Nigeria - Ogunleye et al (original) (raw)
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The study was undertaken primarily to investigate the final year University students’ perception of issues related to agriculture as a promising career in Nigeria. Two Federal Universities offering agriculture were selected from Northern Nigeria. In each of the selected Universities, information was elicited from 50% of the final year agriculture students with the help of semi structured questionnaire. The data collected were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The result revealed that about 57% of the respondents were male and about 7.0% were married. Majority (60.0%) of the respondents were between the ages bracket of 23-27years. Over 87.0% had e-mail address and 60.5% had personal computer. About 20% of the respondents chose to read agriculture in the University when seeking for admission, though 50.8% have been involved practically in one form of agriculture enterprise or the other before they were admitted. About 93.0% of them opined that they had no regrets studying agriculture and 95% of the respondents stated that they would like to put their professional qualification in agriculture into practice in the future. Analysis of the data also revealed that the respondents believed that agriculture is a major means of generating employment for young people (mean=3.5) and that it has the potential in addressing the problems of unemployment and under-employment among the youths (mean=2.9). Assurance of profit (mean=3.4) and availability of technology (mean=3.5) were also reported to likely draw the attention of youths to farming. The Pearson Product Moment Correlation showed a significant positive correlation between perception of agriculture and the extent of achievement of vision /mission statement (r=0.29; p = 0.05), possession of electronic mail address (r=0.28; p = 0.05) and also with information sources (r=0.24; p = 0.05) There was however, a negative but significant correlation between perception of agriculture and preferred agricultural course of respondents. The implications of this result are discussed. This paper concludes that luring of more students’ into agricultural profession is imperative for sustainable growth. Agriculture should be deliberately tied to the interests of the youth. It recommends that University vision/mission statements should be designed and sharpened in such a way to encourage students’ dedication to agriculture as a career in order to sustain food security and transformation agenda in Nigeria. Key words: Agriculture, Perception, career, Final year students, Nigeria
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This study examined willingness to venture into agriculture-related enterprises after graduation among final year agriculture students of Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta (FUNAAB) by randomly sampling 120 final year students from the three agriculture colleges in the university with the aid of structured questionnaires. Data collected were subjected to descriptive and inferential statistics. Results revealed that higher proportions of the students were males (53.6%), Christians (74.1%), with mean age of 24.08±2.37 years and had parents who were well educated. Majority (85.7%) were willing to venture into agriculture-related enterprises with livestock production enterprise (67.7%) been the most preferred enterprise. Major reasons for students’ willingness were identified to include students’ desire to be job creators and self employed, lucrative nature of agriculture and encouragement received during training. Lack of credit loan facilities for agriculture graduates and un...
International Journal of Agriculture and Rural Development, (IJARD), 2019
The study identified the Perception of final year agriculture students towards farming as a means of sustainable livelihood in Rivers State. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 173 respondents for the study. Data was collected with the aid of a questionnaire and analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings showed that 57.22% of the respondents were between the ages of 22-24 years. About 73% of the respondents were willing to take up farming as a means of sustainable livelihood. Livelihood preference of respondents in other areas of agriculture other than farming showed that majority preferred to work in commercial banks (5.0), agricultural company (3.62), ministry of agriculture (3.23), food processing industry (3.39), agricultural bank (4.05), Non-governmental organizations (4.27) and agricultural marketing departments (4.46). The major perceived challenges of respondents in taking up farming as a means of sustainable livelihood include inaccessibility of land, high cost of farm machineries, and insufficient initial capital. It was recommended that Government agencies and NGOs should make available incentives and farm machineries for Agriculture graduates who are willing to take up farming as a means of sustainable livelihood. Land should be easily assessable to agriculture graduates to encourage their willingness to work, this could be done through lease by the government and other governmental bodies in charge of land allocation.
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Willingness and Motivation of Nigerian Youth to Pursue Agricultural Careers after Graduation
International Journal of Agricultural Science, Research and Technology in Extension and Education Systems (IJASRT in EESs), 2021
Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has the world’s highest proportion of young population and there has been widespread interest in and calls for engaging this youth in agricultural occupations for achieving sustainable agricultural development and food security in the region. Yet, very little is known if the youth themselves are willing to take up such employments and what would motivate them to do so. We investigated these questions in the context of Nigeria. A questionnaire was designed with insights from the Expectancy-Value Theory of motivation. Data were collected from over nine hundred undergraduate students of agriculture in four Nigerian universities to investigate their willingness and motivations to pursue an agricultural career after graduation and analysed using descriptive statistics and Principal Axis factoring. Vast majority of the students were willing to pursue an agricultural career and self-employment based on agricultural production was their most preferred choice, which varied according to gender, rural vs. urban residence, and study programmes. Both Success Expectancy (perception of own ability/competence to perform agricultural tasks) and Utility Value (usefulness of agriculture to achieve career goals) exerted positive motivational influence on the students’ willingness, with Utility Value being more influential. Motivation based on Utility Value also had the strongest influence on career choice. These findings can guide policy and intervention design to ensure maximum impact and effectiveness in increasing and sustaining educated youths in agriculture.
The study aimed at identifying the factors determining the choice of Agriculture professional career among the Students of the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences in Ekiti State University, Nigeria. A total of 160 randomly selected respondents were utilized for the study, while a structured interview schedule was used to elicit information from them. Frequency counts and percentages, Likert scale, as well as, Probit model were used in data analysis. The respondent's ages ranged from 16 to 32 years with an average of 19.5 years. They belonged to all the religion in the country. Majority of the males were from farming families and had childhood homes in rural areas. Previous educational performance (mean = 2.53), career flexibility (mean 2.37), contacts/peer groups (mean = 2.35), work experience (mean = 2.28), personal interest and by chance (mean = 2.11 respectively) and self employment influence the choice of agriculture profession. Most of the respondents perceived agriculture as a stepping stone to other professions, a poor man's job and laborious. Barriers to continuing in the profession include, access to financial resources and land, fear of crop/livestock failure, unpredictable future and psychological problems. Probit model confirmed the significant relationship between previous educational performance, work experience, contacts and economy in the choice of agriculture as a course and profession among youths in the University. The study recommends early stimulation of students interest in agriculture, award of scholarship to agriculture students and provision of grants to graduates in agriculture who desire to embark on enterprises and tailoring school practical experiences towards commercial agriculture.
The success of Ghana's drive to modernize agriculture cannot be realized without harnessing the quality human resource base of the youth, especially graduates from agricultural faculties. This paper therefore examined factors influencing agricultural students of the University for Development Studies (UDS) Intention to take up agribusiness as an avenue for future self-employment. Data for this paper was obtained from a field survey of 292 final year students of the University. A descriptive and Chi-square statistics were used to analyse the data obtained. Results of the analysis found students' perception regarding the prospects of agribusiness enterprises in Ghana to have a statistical significant influence at both 1% and 5% levels of significance on students' intention to take up agribusiness as a future self-employment avenue. Also age, marital status, place of domicile, parental educational background of students, practical agricultural experience and risks tolerance were found to have significant influence on students' intention to take up agribusiness as a source of future self-employment avenue or not. It is recommended that tertiary students pursuing agriculture and agricultural related programmes should be exposed to practical training in agriculture and be properly oriented on the prospects of agriculture as an avenue for selfemployment upon graduation.
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Effort of government at all levels to transform agricultural sector in Nigeria and diversify the economy from oil required that Nigeria educated youth should be persuaded to take active roles in the process. As youth have latent potential to overcome some major constraints to improving agricultural productivity. Major step in this direction is to encourage and support graduates of agriculture and related fields to take up career in agribusiness. On these premises this paper examined willingness of students of vocational agricultural education in colleges of education to take up career in agricultural-entrepreneurship. Questionnaires were given to 76 final year students in the department of Agricultural Science Education, The College of Education, Lanlate. The findings revealed that respondents have positive perceptions of agriculture and agribusiness and showed strong willingness to find their opportunity to contribute as leaders and participants in agricultural sector. Major challe...
1973
The various ass.istance of a number of graduate students is also thankfully recognized by the author. Grateful appreciation is also given to Mrs. Mary Rhoads for her assistance and efficiency in typing the manuscript. The author also recognizes the various contributions, including encouragement and assistance in compiling the data, by his wife, Felicia Ola. Oja, who happened to be in the United States at the time this study was being conducted. i i i Farming Situation in Nigeria With Regards to Young Educated Man ••• Why Agriculture and Food? An Interview Summary rr±. DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY Development of the Instrument Collection of the Data. Analysis of the Data • •. •. rt. PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF THE DATA.