Editorial PrEfacE The growing use of new generation, mobile-based, information and communication technologies (ICT) has expanded opportunities for food and agricultural marketing and rural financial service delivery among the smallholder farming community in Sub-Saharan Africa. Smallholder farmers in developing countries have struggled for many years under difficult conditions of poor access to...

Despite the tremendous need for extension approaches that contribute to poverty reduction in rural sub-Saharan Africa, many extension models have been tried with only limited success. A popular model at the moment is the farmer field schools (FFS) approach, based on adult education principles such as experiential learning. Farmer field schools are intensive, season-long programs where farmers m...

Body height and mass were determined in girls aged 10.5-18.5 years in three periods: 1977 (n = 1028), 1987 (n = 1255) and in 1997 (n = 1992). The families of those girls were classified into three categories: farmers, farmer-workers and non-farmers. The economical crisis affected predominantly the rural non-farmer population while farmers were most independent from food rationing. After the cha...

Kenyan farmers’ livelihoods are closely linked to climate conditions. Almost three-quarters of the labor force depend on agriculture for their livelihoods, and almost all farmers depend on timely and adequate rainfall for crop production and husbandry, as only 2 percent of cultivated area is equipped for irrigation. Thus, climate variability and change will have an increasing impact on agricult...

The present study was carried out to know the rural livelihood sustainability of suicideprone farmers families of Vidarbha. Total 60 families of suicide victim farmers were selected randomly from 46 villages for this study it covers total 9 Tahsils of 6 distress districts of Vidarbha. The study revealed that the rural livelihood sustainability of majority (83.33%) of the families was found to b...

This study was conducted to reveal the impact of rural-urban migration on broiler production in the Niger Delta Region of Nigeria. Data were collected from 795 household heads and farmers/managers/supervisors of 25 selected broiler farms in the study area. Descriptive statistics and multiple regression analysis was utilized to analyze the data. Able bodied young men constituted most of the rura...

Drawing upon unique transaction-level data from rural Ethiopia, this paper tests for general forms of imperfect competition among rural wholesale traders. These are key to the grain distribution system as they purchase from farmers and perform interregional trade. Tests show that traders in a typical source market engage in imperfectly competitive behavior in purchasing from farmers, driving do...

Canadian studies examining suicide among rural and farm populations remain scarce. To better understand this phenomenon, a qualitative research paradigm was used to analyze encounter forms of 29 individuals (24 men, 5 women) who called the Manitoban Farm and Rural Stress Line. Content analysis revealed 7 major themes: (a) coping mechanisms, (b) financial concerns, (c) health issues, (d) family ...

The study was undertaken to obtain baseline information on socio-economic status of rural pig farmers and different management practices in Tripura. A total of 200 rural households owning pigs were interviewed randomly. In the study, the most of the pig farmers were female (76.5%) and small proportion was male (23.5%). Majority of pig farmers were ST (68%) followed by SC (28%) and a small propo...