doi: 10.5191/jiaee.2018.25107Communicating Agriculture and Nutrition:Opportunities for Agricultural Extension-Communication and Advisory Services in Nepal

摘要

Meeting the dual goal of improving income and enhancing the nutrition status of Nepal’s ruralresidents is the mandate of the Integrating Gender and Nutrition within Agricultural ExtensionServices (INGENAES) project, which is supported by the United States Agency for InternationalDevelopment’s (USAID) Feed the Future initiative. A landscape study that provided an overviewof Nepal’s agriculture and the status of the country’s agricultural extension system (AES)threshed out a primary target audience—rural women. How can they be reached with nutritioninformation through the existing AES? The landscape study also identified 11 organizations asINGENAES collaborators. What opportunities do they offer to advance INGENAES objectives?Following Rice and Foote’s (2001) systems-theoretical approach, this formative evaluationstudy drew from the insights of project and program managers and coordinators, communicationofficers, representatives of non-government organizations (NGOs), extension officers, andeditors and journalists of farm publications who work in the intersection of agriculture andnutrition in Nepal. Data were gathered from a survey of the chief communication and/orextension officers of these 11 partner agencies. Additional data were collected from evaluationquestionnaires completed by project managers and communication officers of 12 governmentand non-government agencies who participated in a seminar-workshop on how to improvegender and nutrition communication. These two methods brought to light opportunities that canbe used to enhance the communication and/or extension of nutrition-enriched agriculturalinformation, especially to rural women. Recommendations for future communications work areoffered.