COMPLETE SCHOOL PROJECT TOPICS & MATERIALS :
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Abstract

The study assessed the communication campaign programs of the federal government’s cassava transformation initiatives as carried out by the National Root Crops Research Institute, Umudike, Abia State. The survey research method using questionnaire and interview was used to obtain data from the respondents. The research work was highly descriptive and inferential in nature. This involved the use of tables and sample percentages as basic descriptive statistical technique employed to analyze the raw data which was obtained from primary sources. The raw data was subsequently subjected to chisquare test and one sample t-Test as major tool for hypotheses testing. The alternate hypotheses of the four hypotheses were all accepted. Findings reveal that, radio, manuals, bulletins, word of mouth, press releases, newsletters, newspapers, newsmagazines, special events and television are some of the campaign programs employed by the National Root Crops Research Institute, Umudike, in the cassava transformation campaign of the federal government. Other campaign strategies employed by the institute during the cassava transformation campaign include: the audience participation model, the 5ps of social marketing. It was concluded that adequate, effective/efficient campaign programs, via the right media and methods of communication, backed up by adequate funding enhance social change and elicit positive responses from the citizens, especially the Nigerian farmers toward appreciating the governmental programs. It was therefore recommended that, in planning any campaign program by either the public or private organizations, aimed at positive change or positive response from the citizens, adequate, effective/efficient campaign programs, such as public relations information, education and communication programs; advertising; face to face contact; publicity; etc must be executed, and this should be done via the right media (print, electronic and created media) and methods (TV announcements and Jingles, radio announcements and jingles, posters, fliers, banners, mobile cinemas, mobile announcements, church announcements, Age-grades, town unions, schools announcements, women associations, traditional rulers, town criers, e.t.c.) and ensuring that adequate funds are provided to back-up the campaign programs, as this is a guaranteed way of achieving the set goals and objectives of the cassava transformation initiatives of the federal government.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.2 Background of the Study

Nigeria is an agrarian country with about 70% of her over 140 million people engaged in agricultural production (NBS/CBN, 2006) and provides subsistence for 2/3 of Nigerians who are low income earners (Usman, 2006). While the Northern part of the country can guarantee the production of cereals such as Sorghum, Maize, millet, groundnut, cowpea and cotton, the middle belt and the south has the potentials to produce root tubers such as cassava, yam, coco yam and other crops like plantain as well as maize (Abdullahi, 2008).

In addition to crops, the country is also involved in the production of livestock fisheries, forestry and wildlife (Ugwu and Kanu, 2012). But recently, there has been declining contributions of agriculture to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the past three decades. This could be associated with the gross neglect of the agricultural sector and over dependence on the oil sector. In the pre and post independence era (1930 to 1965), the Nigerian economy was predicated on agriculture.

Agriculture employed about 70 to 80% of the country labour force (Falusi and Olayide, 1980 quoted in Ugwu and Kanu, 2012) and contributed 60% of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and foreign exchange earnings (CBN, 2006). In the post oil boom era (1977-2002), the price of crude oil started fluctuating and falling, leading to a growing need to revitalize the agricultural sector as well as diversify the economy.

In order to revamp the agricultural sector, the Federal Government has embarked on and implemented several agricultural policies and programmes, some of which are defunct or abandoned while some others are still in place. These include: the farm settlement scheme, National Accelerated Food Production (NAFPP), President Shehu Shagari’s Green Revolution, former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s Operation Feed the Nation and most recently President Goodluck Jonathan’s Agriculture Transformation Programme.

The Agricultural Transformation Programme focuses on achieving a hunger-free Nigeria through an agricultural sector that drives income growth, accelerates achievement of food and nutritional security, generates employment and transforms Nigeria into a leading player in the global food markets as well as to grow wealth for millions of farmers (FMARD, 2011). The transformation action plan for some priority agricultural commodities will be focused in the six geopolitical zones of the country. The commodities are rice, cassava, Sorghum, cocoa, cotton, maize, dairy, beef leather, poultry, oil palm, fisheries as well as agricultural extension (FMARD, 2011).

The cassava transformation action plan/campaign, an initiative of the federal government of Nigeria, seeks to create new generation of cassava-oriented farmers, towards commercial production and farming as a business and to link them up to reliable demands either for processing or guaranteed minimum price scheme of government (FMARD, 2011). It also has the strategy of turning the cassava sector in Nigeria into a major player in local and international starch, sweeteners, ethanol, high quality cassava flour and dried chips industries by adopting improved production and processing technologies and organizing producers and processors into efficient value – added chains (Iweka et al, 2002). In bringing this agenda into reality, Government through its agricultural agencies aims at bringing about a new orientation in the minds of people especially about cassava and its uses.

Cassava has played and continued to play a phenomenal role on the agricultural sector of Nigeria, and subsequently on the GDP of the Nation. Since its debut in the late 1600s on the Portuguese trade ships from Brazil into Nigeria, it has gone from minor crop to a major crop that accounts for between 40 -50% of all calories consumed in Southern and Central Nigeria. Nigeria now ranks the world largest producer of cassava, with current production estimated in 2009 at 36.8 million metric tons (FMARD, 2011). Systematic intervention in the cassava sector began in the early 1980s with the introduction of high yielding, bulking varieties resistant to Cassava Mosiac Disease (CMD) and Cassava Bacterial Blight (CBB); and the establishment of small scale processing facilities (Kormawa, 2003). These two interventions increased profit margin for producers alike and drove down prices of cassava food products for the rural and urban consumers.