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“Area-wide Fruit Fly Integrated Pest Management in South and Southeast Asia” is a regional initiative coordinated by the Asian Institute of Technology with funding support from Taiwan‟s ICDF (www.icdf.org.tw). The project has a focus on adaptation and adoption of fruit fly IPM practices among vegetable and fruit smallholder using Farmer‟s [...]

We are hopeful that the selection of structured learning exercises presented in the manual will provide good inspirational tools to the IPM trainers, extension personnel and farmers to create stimulating learning experiences for FF IPM trainers and farmers leading to sound scientific knowledge base for sustainable management of fruit flies.

Cassava is a major crop used for human consumption, animal feed and bioenergy production, with about 3 million smallholder farmers in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) deriving their livelihoods from the crop. In 2008, the cassava pink mealybug (CM) invaded Thailand, resulting in extensive crop damage. To combat it, the [...]

The Farm Business School consists of a package of training materials intended to inform policy makers, train FBS facilitators and train farmers. The Training of Facilitators Programme is classroom-based and of a short 15 day duration. The Training of Farmers Programme consists of a series of meetings that take place [...]

This publication documents the results of surveys commissioned by FAO in three countries – the Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam – to provide comprehensive up-to-date reviews on fresh produce packaging in the region’s supply chains. Information presented in the publication is based on field surveys, interviews with supply chain stakeholders [...]

The paper discusses the conceptual underpinnings of community-based extension approaches, highlights theoretical and practical challenges inherent in their design, and assesses the evidence available so far on their performance. The paper reviews both quantitative and qualitative studies, focusing on three examples that contain important elements of community-based extension: the [...]

he need to increase agricultural sustainability has induced the government of India to promote the adoption of integrated pest management (IPM). An evaluation of cotton-based conventional and IPM farming systems was conducted in India (2002–2004). The farmers managing the IPM farms had participated in discovery-based ecological training, namely Farmer Field [...]

A project in Ghana tried to encourage government extension agents to change their attitudes. Instead of merely teaching new techniques, they were supposed to engage rice farmers in a two-way learning experience. The extension agents accepted some of the project philosophy, but they still thought that the goal of the [...]

The study found that younger farmers who belong to other groups, such as savings and credit groups, tended to participate in field schools. Females made up 50 percent of FFS membership. Reasons for not joining an FFS included lack of time and information. FFSs were shown to be especially beneficial [...]

This paper describes and highlights lessons learned from several research and development organisations in western Kenya using different community-based approaches to scale up agroforestry and other biological options to improve soil fertility among resource- poor smallholders. The main benefits of such approaches are that the link between farmers, government extension, [...]