Strategies to Improve the Contributions of Agroforestry Research to the Adoption of Tree Planting Among Rural Farmers in Oyo State Nigeria

Abstract

Forestry research efforts meant to solve problems in the forestry sector are not meeting the targeted goals. This is due to some problems encountered by forestry research organizations in Nigeria. The situation in the rural communities in the country is such that most rural farmers are not planting trees as expected, resulting in increasing scarcity of wood products. This has resulted to increased call for tree planting. As such this study takes a look at the contributions of agroforestry research to the adoption of tree planting among rural farmers in Oyo State, Nigeria. It examines the problems faced by research organizations in carrying out research and the problems faced by rural farmers that are planting trees. This is with a view to fashioning out strategies that will help to improve the contributions of forestry research organizations to the adoption of tree planting among rural famers in the study area. Two sets of questionnaires were used to collect data for this study. The first set was administered on forestry researchers at Forestry Research Institute of Nigeria (FRIN) Ibadan and at Oyo State Forestry Department, Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources (20 copies each). The second set of questionnaire was administered on rural farmers in the state. Five LGAs out of thirty-three LGAs (14%) were purposively selected. Three rural communities in each sampled LGA were randomly selected to make a total of 15 communities. Twenty local farmers were purposively selected in each sampled community to make a total of 300 respondents. The results of the study showed that the areas agroforestry research has influenced tree planting among rural farmers include tree breeding, forest economics and marketing and forestry extension. Forestry research organizations are however faced with some problems in the conduct of agroforestry research. The most prominent among these problems are lack of funds and poor power supply. Rural farmers are also faced with some problems which hinder them from planting trees. These problems include lack of land, non-availability of tree seedlings and long gestation period of trees. In view of these the following strategies can help to improve the contribution of agroforestry research to the adoption of tree planting among rural farmers in the study area. These include improved forestry extension, improved funding of forestry research, improved training for forestry research personnel and provision of land to rural farmers.