Farmers’ Perceptions of Livestock Extension Services in District Dera Ismail Khan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

Abstract

The economy of the country is based on Agriculture. It contributes 18.5% to the in gross domestic product (GDP) and absorbs 38.5% of population that offers working opportunities, however, it remains not a major sector of economy, and effective farming is a key to economic development and eradication of poverty. D.I. Khan District has livestock as one of its major sectors in the rural economy. It is not only used as an endowment to poor farmers, but it also forms a crucial source of nutrition particularly milk and meat. This research was conducted in the district of D.I. Khan to determine the perception of the farmers on livestock extension services and analyse the contribution of livestock extension services. Purposely, out of 21 Union councils of selected tehsil D.I. Khan, three union councils viz. Dewala, Lachra and Muryali were sampled, as the highest of the population of the farming community members practice livestock in these UCs. Each of the union councils was randomly picked in two villages. In this research 30 percent of respondents were picked through proportional allocation method. Statistical Package of Social Sciences (SPSS) was used in the analysis of the data collected. As was also discovered, 36.4 percent of respondents were aged between 31-40 years. The respondents that fell within the age group of 30 years were 31.2% percent, those who fell between the age group of 41-50 years were 20 percent and respondents in the above 50 years fell in the old age category. The current research indicates that 27.2 percent respondents were illiterate and other 72.8 percent respondents were literate, 49 percent respondents rely on agriculture as a source of income and 36 percent respondents were relying on both agriculture and non-agriculture as their source of income but 15 percent respondents relied on non-agriculture as the source of income. Approximately forty-eight percent of the respondents stated that livestock extension department offers them information on modern technologies then followed by NGOs (25.6%), fellow farmers (16.8%), self-motivation (5.6%), and radio and TV (4%). Most (67%) of the respondents were happy with the services offered by livestock extension department. But, 33 percent of the respondents were dissatisfied with the livestock department. The conclusion of the study is that most of the respondents were pleased with livestock extension services of livestock department, yet livestock sector remains a subject of numerous problems and challenges such as livestock production, marketing problems and insufficient priority at the level of planning. Access and acquisition of livestock inputs is also becoming problematic to farmers. It is suggested that the interaction between the livestock extension workers with the farmers should be on weekly basis and also should be armed with the recent extension knowledge and communication skills.