"It all goes back to trust": a qualitative exploration of extension professionals' perceptions of COVID-19 vaccines in rural Florida

While urban communities experienced high levels of infection at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, rural communities experienced an increase of confirmed cases during the fall months of 2020. Rural Americans were also among the most hesitant to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. The purpose of this study was to explore the perceptions of [State] extension professionals related to the COVID-19 vaccines in rural communities. Qualitative methods were utilized to gather data from extension professionals in rural area of [State], where vaccine uptake was below average. Results revealed frustration with the vaccine process, vaccine norms, and skepticism and mistrust to all be contributing factors to vaccine hesitancy in rural communities. Extension professionals discussed not feeling comfortable discussing topics related to public health with their clientele, citing the topic being outside their expertise. Practical recommendations from this study included utilizing a grassroots approach rather than relying on mass media, providing messages related to the COVID-19 vaccine that focus on education, rather than promotion, and testing new messages before they are disseminated.

Assessing climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies and agricultural innovation systems in the Niger Delta.

Climate change and its impacts on agriculture have been widely discussed at national and global levels. An important aspect of the discussion has been adaptation/mitigation approaches. Consequently, several strategies have been suggested as measures to ensure agriculture remains productively profitable. However, food security especially in critical times, such as the lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic proved to be a challenge even for regions naturally endowed for agriculture. The study evaluated research recommended strategies, and further examined the innovativeness of the strategies in fostering sustainable agricultural innovation system (AIS) in the Niger Delta. The study relied on both secondary and primary data; analysed 129 previous studies and gathered responses from 282 extension agents. The study introduces a method for assessing the innovativeness of strategies by calculating their rated values on five traits. Findings revealed the issues and implications of adopting most recommended strategies and the place of most strategies in fostering AIS. The study highlights the possible reasons why farmers fail to adopt most strategies as suggested by studies on climate change in the region. Based on the findings, recommendations were made on the way forward. The study adds to the scanty discussion of climate change and AIS at regional levels, particularly in the climate change prone and oil rich Niger Delta region. The study offers a novel approach for scoring innovations in agriculture.

Agricultural extension systems response to COVID-19 outbreak in Egypt and Nigeria

COVID-19 pandemic has brought setbacks to all human endeavours globally, in the sectors of health, education, tourism, and agriculture. African agriculture is greatly affected by the pandemic and lockdown, in particular the peasant farmers. In this regard, the agricultural extension service which has been responsible for the dissemination of innovation to the farmers becomes an indispensable platform to sensitize farmers on COVID-19 and preventive measures. Hence, this paper aimed to investigate the agricultural extension systems' response to the COVID-19 outbreak in Egypt and Nigeria. A questionnaire was administered to 200 extension agents randomly selected from the government institutions in Egypt and Nigeria. The results showed that the degree of agricultural extension staff commitment to the precautionary measures for the COVID-19 epidemic in Nigeria (x = 6.32) was higher than that in Egypt (x= 2.59). Nigerian agricultural extension agents recorded a higher contribution (x=8.82) at reducing the spread of COVID-19 than Egyptian counterparts (x = 5.52). Although the demand for agricultural extension service in Nigeria is twice that of Egypt, extension service delivery during COVID-19 in the two countries was affected by frequent changes in the operating plans, poor funding, and inconsistent internal work system. The study recommends, establishing an electronic extension platform and coordinating agricultural extension services (AES) actors including private and public sectors, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), producer organizations (POs) and the ministry of health (MOH) to face this crisis, especially in Egypt.

IRRI annual report 2020 - unprecedented

This annual report provides information on the negative effects brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic to global agriculture and food systems and the various strategies applied by the International Rice Research Institute to tackle and overcome these negative effects. The success of various activities in partnership with respective partner agencies, such as a regional training workshop with Vietnam to introduce tools that support planning and decision-making for mitigation projects in rice farming, a webinar on laser land-leveling for Filipino farmers as well as the launching of the Rice Crop Manager Philippines, a blended virtual training for agricultural extension workers on delivering advisories to rice farmers through a weather-rice-nutrient integrated decision support system, and a blended workshop on digital data collection in Myanmar, among others, are discussed. The importance of strengthening collaboration and building more inclusive and robust partnerships with various governments despite the COVID-19 disruption is also pointed out.

Frontline extension professionals & COVID-19: supporting household food security & building resilience. (Special Issue: Journal of international agricultural and extension education.)

The world was not prepared for the COVID-19 pandemic. It has tremendously impacted health and food systems around the world and the depth and breadth of its long-term effects are yet to be seen. The rates of those that will be in poverty and food insecure are significantly higher than the predictions pre-COVID. People are coping in any way that they can, at times in ways that will have lasting impacts on their households and communities. A community's ability to absorb, adapt, and transform in the face of crisis can significantly impact how it is able to survive and thrive during those challenging times. A frontline extension professional can equitably build assets and thus capitals, ultimately increasing household and community resilience.