Liberia

Developing Local Extension Capacity
World Wide Extension Study

Developing Local Extension Capacity
World Wide Extension Study

Developing Local Extension Capacity

liberia Extract of a study by the The Feed the Future Developing Local Extension Capacity (DLEC) project led by Digital Green, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Care International and GFRAS.

Spurred by the 2007-2008 global food crisis and following years of disregard, agricultural extension and advisory services (EAS) are increasingly receiving the attention of the development community. The EAS of today are not the same as EAS of yesteryear and, as such, are progressively viewed as a critical piece in advancing agricultural development and solving the challenging puzzle of reducing hunger and poverty. EAS is one of several agricultural preconditions, including farmer-focused research; accessible markets, inputs, land and profitable technologies; financial services; and a supporting enabling environment, necessary to achieve inclusive economic development and hunger and poverty reduction.

The traditional and linear view of EAS holds that researchers give extensionists agricultural production technology and extensionists then train farmers to use it. EAS have evolved considerably and are herein defined more broadly as: All the different activities that provide the information and services that are needed and demanded by farmers and others along value chains to know about and make informed decisions regarding agricultural practices in order to improve their livelihoods and well-being (Christoplos, 2010; Hird-Younger & Simpson, 2013). Practices include, for example, those related to production, processing, marketing and finance.

The African-led initiative to transform continental agriculture, Comprehensive Africa Agricultural Development Program (CAADP), recognizes that attaining the goal of six percent annual growth in agriculture, agreed upon by those countries party to the program, requires investments in a range of agricultural services including EAS. The recent CAADP Strategy and Roadmap to accelerate African agricultural growth and transformation for shared prosperity and improved livelihood indicates a key action is “to support agricultural research and development (R&D) and advisory services for the development, dissemination and adoption of technologies and innovations” (African Union, 2014, p. 22).

The United States Agency for International Development (USAID), along with other bilateral and multilateral assistance, supports CAADP. In sync with CAADP extension objectives is the recently launched USAID-funded Developing Local Extension Capacity (DLEC) project. DLEC is a global project which targets Feed the Future focus and aligned countries in Africa and those on other continents.

DLEC, a five-year activity, is led by Digital Green. The project is implemented in partnership with the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), CARE International the Global Forum for Rural Advisory Services (GFRAS) and multiple resource partners. By collaborating with USAID missions, host-country governments, public and private EAS providers, rural civil society organizations, and host-country research institutes, DLEC helps host-country EAS become more effective, accountable, scalable and sustainable.

This report is a component of DLEC’s initial diagnostic work and is a desk study of EAS in Liberia. The USAID Country Development Cooperation Strategy for Liberia 2013-2017 has Sustained Market-Driven Economic Growth as one of its Development Objectives (USAID/Liberia, n.d.). Relative to EAS, the approach to achieve this development objective encompasses support for Government of Liberia (GOL) reforms to redefine and reorganize its systems for delivering extension as well as support to enhance both public and private provision of extension (USAID/Liberia, n.d.). The purpose of this report is to provide information on the status of EAS in Liberia by building on existing literature and to make recommendations for future EAS interventions to strengthen Liberia’s EAS system that could contribute to the DLEC learning agenda. Recommendations are intended for consideration by any interested EAS stakeholder.

Full report:

Liberia: Desk Study of Extension and Advisory Services, DLEC, 2017

World Wide Extension Study

liberia

The World Wide Extension Study WWES provided empirical data on the human and financial resources of agricultural extension and advisory systems worldwide. The programme ran from 2009-2012 and was funded by USAID and managed by IFPRI in partnership with FAO (along with DAAS and CIRAD) and IICA.

Extension in Liberia finds itself in a transition period as the country moves from the period of post-war relief and rehabilitation to an environment of development and growth. One of the four pillars of the country’s overall poverty reduction strategy is rebuilding infrastructure and providing basic services to a population including people economically active in agriculture. The pluralistic extension system in Liberia includes extension activities and programs delivered by NGOs, the Ministry of Agriculture’s (MOA) Extension program, and a variety of emerging private sector actors. While these three entities differ in their approach to extension and programs delivery to farmers, coordination comes from the Ministry of Agriculture through a committee (Agriculture Coordinating Committee) within the Department of Rural Development, Extension and Research, which meets monthly at the national level. These meetings serve as a platform for all extension actors for discussion of policy and agricultural concerns, and sharing of programmatic approaches.

Extension Providers

Major Extension Providers

The Department of Research, Extension and Rural Development (DRERD) is the most visibly decentralized department at the field level which faces similar staffing challenges as the MOA itself. According to the CAAS-Lib Synthesis Report (2007), the Department had only 20 of its 134 staff members deployed outside Monrovia, the Country’s capital. Although the MEAS Mission (2011) could not document the human resources capacity in the public and private extension service in Liberia, the report noted the shortage in extension personnel and recommended that the MOA hire at least another 70 qualified extension staff. The need for adding more Subject Matter Specialists (SMSs) who provide backstopping support to the field staff is critical given that at the present time a limited number of SMSs are actually located in the Department of Technical Services (DTS), which is a different unit from the DRERD.

Public Sector

The public sector is represented by the Ministry of Agriculture, the University of Liberia, College of Agriculture, and other universities and research institutions around the country. These institutions provide extension services through various departments and institutes listed below:

Public Extension Institutions

Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) www.moa.gov.lr
- Department of Regional Development, Research and Extension (DRDRE)

Public Research and Education Institutions

Central Agricultural Research Institute (CARI)
Forest Development Authority (FDA)
Liberia Rubber Research Institute (LRRI)
University of Liberia, College of Agriculture
Cuttington University
Booker T. Washington’s (BTW) Vocational Education Institute
Songhai Agro-Enterprise Center
Department of Agricultural Extension and Education

Non-Public Sector

Private Sector Firms

The private sector in Liberia remains very underdeveloped and is still recovering from the war. The sector’s provision of extension and advisory services is noticeable in the areas of input supply to farmers; contract to provide extension services and technical advice to farmers associations, or in outgrower schemes method (e.g. a core farm or processing company that provides services and/or inputs to outgrower farms). In the outgrower scheme method, the private company works with the growers of a commodity to provide inputs on a contract basis, which is then paid off at the time these commodities are sold o the business. Most private sector suppliers of agricultural inputs are based in Monrovia and most of their businesses is conducted with NGOs who purchase inputs on behalf of farmers.

Non-Governmental Organizations and other Donors

Prior to 1990, there were only four major international NGOs operating in Liberia (Partners for Productivity, Plan International, SOS Children Village and Experiment in International Living). Currently there are more than 34 local NGOs in the country, working in four sectors: agriculture and food production, business development, and education and sanitation. To support the Government effort in providing extension and advisory services to the largest possible number of farmers in Liberia, about 60 local and international NGOs currently assist farmers through funded projects in different counties and districts. These NGO are actively involved in implementing different strategies to increase agricultural productivity and farm income among small-scale farm households both in urban and rural areas. The New African Research and Development Agency (NARDA), a consortium of Liberian NGOs formed in 1987 coordinates the activities of NGOs, which operate through county networks. NGOs in Liberia have some potential but do not currently contribute to the research effort. Funds available for projects come from several donors and the most cited are USAID, FAO, IFAD, Gate & Melinda Foundation, Some of the larger international NGOs include:

ACDI-VOCA
Action-Aid, International Relief and Development (IRD)
Africare-Liberia
BRAC
CARE International
Catholic Relief Services (CRS)
Concern Worldwide (CW)
Danish Relief Council (DRC)
German Agro Action (GAA)
Human Development Foundation (HDF)
Partners for Productivity
Plan International
Samaritan’s Purse

Farmer Based Organizations and Cooperatives

Producer organizations that group together smallholders and other forms of collective action (e.g., cooperatives) have proven to be effective in improving the performance of value chains and contributing to improved farmer welfare. In Liberia, famers in each county are organized into community, farmer and/or producer groups. The size of the group varies between thirty and approximately one hundred members. The County Extension Officer (CEO) is responsible for facilitating the organization and coordination of these groups. Producers are organized on the basis of the crops they produce. In Margibi County for example we have community groups such as cacao producers (mainly men), corn and peanut growers, rice and vegetable crops (cassava, pineapple) grower, and collective farming group. Some NGOs like BRAC use an integrated approach of providing micro-credit, inputs and advisory services to women. To implement their program, BRAC organizes women farmers as well as rural women into community groups. Other farmer based organizations include:

Progressive Farmer Organization, provides hand tools and seed supplied by the FAO through the CEO to farmers
Women in Peace Building Network specialized in producing vegetables (okra, long green bean etc.) on public land allocated by the MOA
United Farmers Association, has been operational for 5 years and focus on producing roots and tubers

These organizations and many more throughout Liberia have the merit of facilitating the provision of services such as extension, credit, inputs and marketing and through economies of scale, increase market power which may prove elusive to a single farmer.

Enabling Environment

Enabling (or Disabling) Environment

There are various missing links or weak connections between research, extension and farmers needs that prevent a proper flow of extension information from research laboratories to farmers’ field. Presently, the links between the research function of the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) and the extension agents and program of the MOA appear very limited. The lack of sufficient funds and the current emphasis on pressing needs and projects (rice seed multiplication) explain the insufficient coordination between these entities. Over time these links need to be strengthened and other applied research at Cuttington University and University of Liberia need to be connected to extension efforts. Liberian extension staff would benefit from easier access to existing technologies and agricultural research developed within the West African region.

ICT

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) for Agriculture and Extension

Internet has changed the way people communicate today and agricultural extension in many countries has adopted the new technology to improve its communication and information delivery system to famers. Although Liberia lags behind some other African countries like Ghana and Rwanda in term of internet access, the FAO project has provided internet access (through cell communication) to most if not all the County Agriculture offices. For extension staff to access and share information with producers, they will need communication devices and training on how to utilize them. Access to high-speed internet and the establishment of the Cooperative Development Agency (CDA) with the primary objective of making market information available for all of the major staple, horticulture, and tree crops as well as market information for livestock, fish and other agricultural products, will help extension service staffs better serve farmers. In addition, other technologies including mp3 players with pre-recorded extension messages, computer tablets with store extension materials, and printed brochures and pamphlets would usefully play a role in strengthening extension efforts.

Training

Training for Extension Professionals

It is apparent that many extension staff from the MOA needs in-service and pre-service training to some extends to cope with the changing environment. The University of Liberia through its Department of Agriculture can provide pre-service training at the bachelor level. The innovation could involve reevaluating and assessing the curriculums and courses in the general area of agricultural extension and development being offered, identifying gaps, and taking specific steps to address the gaps and related capacity issues. At the level of in-service training, a comprehensive staff development program should be implemented that identifies gaps in staff capacities (ICT, agricultural technologies, extension methods, environmental and water management, etc.) and develop a means of addressing these gaps.

Statistics

Statistical Indicators

Liberia Year
Agricultural land (sq km)	26,180	2008
Agricultural land (% of land area)	27.2	2008
Arable land (hectares)	400,000	2008
Arable land (% of land area)	4.15	2008
Arable land (hectares per person)	0.11	2008
Fertilizer consumption (per ha of arable land)
Agriculture, value added (% of GDP)	61.3	2008
Food production index (1999-2001 = 100)	131	2009
Food exports (% of merchandise exports)
Food imports (% of merchandise imports)
GNI per capita, Atlas method (current US$)	160	2009
Literacy rate, adult total (% of people ages 15 and above)*	59.1	2009
Literacy rate, youth female (% of females ages 15-24)	80.9	2009
Ratio of young literate females to males (% ages 15-24)	115	2009
Ratio of female to male secondary enrollment (%)
Mobile cellular subscriptions (per 100 people)	15.5	2007
	19.3	2008
	21.3	2009
Internet users (per 100 people)	0.6	2007
	0.5	2008
	0.5	2009
Population, total	3,954,979	2009
Population density (people per sq. km of land area)	41.1	2009
Rural population	1,549,561	2009
Rural population (% of total population)	39.2	2009

Agricultural population*	2,399,000	2008
Agricultural population (% of total population)*	63	2008
Total economically active population in Agriculture*	883,000	2008
Total economically active population in Agriculture (in % of total economically active population)*	63	2008
Female economically active population in Agriculture (% of total active in agriculture)*	45	2008

Source: The World Bank, *Food and Agriculture Organization FAO

List of Extension Providers

The following list shows an excerpt from the GFRAS Directory of Extension Providers for Liberia. Some of these entries may be specially marked for having more detailed information in the database of the Worldwide Extension Study WWES.