ASSESSMENT OF THE FARMER BUSINESS SCHOOL TRAINING PROGRAMME ON COCOA FARMERS’ ENTERPRENEURAL SKILL ACQUISITION IN ORIADE LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA, OSUN-STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

The study assessed the Farmer Business School training programme on cocoa farmers’ entrepreneurial skill acquisition in Oriade Local Government Area, Osun-state, Nigeria. Ninety cocoa farmers who participated in the Farmer Business Training School (FBS) were randomly selected from three (3) communities in the study area. A structured interview schedule was used to collect information from them. The data collected were analyzed using frequency counts, percentages and Chi square. The study shows that the mean age of the farmers that participated in FBS was 57 years. Most of them were mostly married and of the male gender with a mean farming experience of 26years, over half of them had one form of formal education or the other. The respondents perceived that they have acquired very high entrepreneurial innovation, marketing, and production skills. They also had savings after sales and daily money management skills. They perceived that they had high entrepreneurship knowledge in planning skills, risk taking skills and profit maximization. The major constraints to the maximum utilization of the skills acquired by farmers in Farmer Business School are lack of financial/credit facilities, Poor input supply, and Inadequate trained manpower. The result of the hypothesis revealed that the farmer business school training programmes positively influenced the entrepreneurial skills acquired by the cocoa farmers. There was a positive and significant relationship between the perceived levels of the entrepreneurial skill acquired by the farmers and their farm size (r=0.002; p≥0.05) and income (r=0.020; p≥0.05) at 5% level of significant. The study recommends that more farmers should enrol in FBS to develop their entrepreneurship skills and see farming as a business.