Cooperative and Non Cooperative Poultry Farmers Access to Extension Services in North Central Nigeria

This study was conducted to evaluate the level of agrochemical safety measures among rice farmers in the Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria. Multi stage sampling technique was used to sample respondents for the study while primary data were collected using well-structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics and multiple linear regression analysis were used to actualize the objectives of the study. The socio-economic characteristics of the respondents showed that majority (82.5%) of the rice farmers were male while 70% of them were married. The average household size of the respondents was 6.38 while the average age of respondents was 39.06 years, and this implies that majority of the respondents are still within the productive active age and can effectively engage in farming activities. Meanwhile, the average year of farming experience of the respondents was 21.31 years. Also, most (53.06%) of them had at least a secondary school education, their average farm size was 2.3 hectares while the average income of the farmers was N180,035.5. The result revealed that most of the respondents were aware of agrochemicals’ safety measures, which are wearing of personal protective equipment when using agrochemicals, operational safety habits, proper disposal practices and safe storage of agrochemicals. Also, majority (97.22%) of the respondents were aware of the health implications associated with the use of agrochemicals. The factor that influenced the adoption of agrochemicals’ safety measures among rice farmers in the study area the most was trialability of the practices with a mean score of 2.1 which is higher than the mid-point of 2.0. Also, the result shows that there was generally a low level of adoption of personal protective equipment among the farmers. Meanwhile, the most adopted operational safety habits among them was “not drinking while spraying” while the most adopted agrochemical disposal practice among them was “keeping of containers in safe disposal site”. Also, the most adopted safe storage practice among the farmers was ensuring that “agrochemicals are not stored in kitchens or toilets”. Furthermore, the result of the multiple regression analysis showed that household size and educational qualification were both significant at 5% while age was significant at 10% probability level. It was recommended that more awareness on the implications of unsafe use and exposure to agrochemicals should be carried out through a series of high level sensitization and enlightenment campaigns.