Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Box 2  Experiences of Nwodua women
Nwodua is a small village 5 km east of Tamale in Northern Ghana. In a village meeting
about compost and chemical fertilisers women mentioned:
• when we use chemical fertilisers worms disappear
• the soil becomes very hard when we use chemical fertilisers
• after two years of using fertilisers the soil is dead, nothing will grow!
• compost keeps the soil moist
• compost makes the soil soft and easier to handle
• compost works for years while chemical fertilisers are finished after one year.
The women were very sure about their observations.
industry and when farmers do not supply their soils with organic matter to catch and hold the
nutrients, the soil degrades and erodes to such a level that the land can no longer be used for
farming. The technical approach to develop agriculture has failed in Northern Ghana.
Extension method is top down
The present focus of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (GV2020 2005) and other agricul-
tural non-government organisations (NGOs) in Northern Ghana is still the same as the rec-
ommendations given by Mr Lynn in 1937. Sixty-seven years of agricultural extension and still
the same problems! How is that possible? In many discussions with farmers, an additional
problem was found with top-down extension methods. Many of the extension workers,
researchers and politicians see rural people as backward and do not see the value of rural
knowledge, views and attitudes. Top-down extension methods do not support agricultural
development in this situation.
The organic approach: sustainability as a subject of extension
and participation as an extension method
Many experts in development emphasise that development should start from traditional
knowledge, attitudes and practices and should fit into the local way of ref lecting, thinking and
doing. To introduce any new techniques without an idea or feasibility study on how these tech-
niques could fit in the social set up of the community and how they fit in the worldview of
rural people, may easily lead to disappointments or as scientists say to 'low adoption rates'.
Boxes 3, 4 and 5 ref lect the integrated view of rural people. This complex mix or complete inte-
gration of material, social and cultural meaning of trees, animals, machines and so on should
be the starting point of a development process.
A disciplinary solution towards a multidisciplinary problem will not work. Besides this
single technical focus on development, the top-down approach of introducing new techniques
does not fit into the traditional way of communication and development. Traditionally a new
technique is, after introduction into a Ghanaian community, discussed at the community level
in a meeting where groups (e.g. elders, women, the youth), opinion leaders (e.g. the teacher,
local politician, traditional priest, pastor ) and people from outside (e.g. government extension
worker, university researcher) put forward their points of view. The task of the chief is to come
to a decision that is supported by all participants of the meeting. This process takes time,
sometimes even years. But the village meeting is normally the place where important decisions
are discussed and made. Too many development projects in Ghana do not pay enough atten-
tion to this traditional way of community development.
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