An outreach report carried out at Arapai A village, Arapai sub county, Soroti district

Abstract

Outreach is one of the course modules. offered at BUAC by second year students of programs, CGA, DAP and DCP that involves teaching out to farmers in various locations covering three zones of Arapai, Aloet and Arabaka. From these, I was allocated to Arapai A Zone Temele village, I as a member of Group 6, With my main objective of delivering extension work to farmers, hereby correlating theoretically what is learnt by putting it into practice at different farmers’ homesteads. As an aim of exposing students to the surrounding communities as a way of improving their communication skills through interacting with farmers this contributes greatly to bridging the gap between the university and the famers in the surrounding areas. In Akapai Zone A, Temele village the area is generally flat with scattered local coconut plantations and sandy-loamy soils. The climate in the region is presented to be semi-arid. From 12th march to 16th April our outreach sessions were initially commenced in Arapai A Temele village, Arapai Sub-county Soroti District. Emphasis was basically put on farmers with appropriate knowledge and practical skills in animal and crop production and management practices carried out included; management of banana plantation, management practices in the orchard like weeding around the banana plantation, pruning among others as broadly discussed in this dissertation. Livestock management practices included; deworming treatment of the animals. A number of skills were attained throughout the entire outreach program experience and some of them include; improving of our communication skills, proper ways of establishing banana plantation, treatment of animals, making or the plate stand and making of the energy saving stove. However, challenges as well were encountered like, language barrier, long distances, shortage of tools etc. Despite the negatives, we were able to successfully complete the outreach program. Though, we recommend that the university should provide aids in teaching to smoothen the outreach sessions and allocate more time for the entire program as a way to maximize dissemination of knowledge to the farmer.