Farmer participatory research in integrated pest management through the farmer field school approach

In 1993 SC-UK carried out a helicopter survey in North-East Highlands. The report "Making Ends Meet" emphasised the major constraints to the local household food economy. Based on the findings, SC-UK designed an Emergency Pest Control Project -EPCP (1994-1996). The EPCP ran for two years and followed by the Agricultural Rehabilitation Project (1996-97), the interim arrangement (1998) and Agricultural Development Project (1999-2002), where more emphasis was given to the provision of pesticides and related materials (sprayers, personal protective equipment etc. and handout). The overall objective of the aforementioned projects was improving the household food security at a household level by reducing the ravage caused by field pests, in particular Wollo Bush Cricket (Degeza) and grasshoppers. The IPM-FFS project (1999-2000) and the current IPM-FFS project have an overall goal that strives to contribute to increased food security through generation, dissemination, and adaptation of appropriate farmer cantered technologies that are suitable for the needs of food insecure farmers. To this effect, SC-UK adapted the "Farmer Field School" approach, which is based on ecological principles, participatory training and non-formal education (NFE) methods. Farmers through FFS learn about IPM though the weekly conduct of Agro-ecosystem Analysis (AESA), which is an educational tool for the empowerment of farmers in the management of their own field-crop ecosystem through informed decision-making based on critical analysis and actual field situations. For the FFS approach to be effective steps like participatory planning, organisation of TOT courses, training of extension workers and farmers and development curriculum are inevitable. Furthermore, the approach has the domain of adult learning, four principles, basic concepts and underlying philosophies that are the cornerstone of the approach. Agreed to the result of various evaluations it was apparent that the projects had positive impacts in terms of food output, change in input use, and use of sustainable technologies that attribute to the improvement of financial, human, social and natural capital aspect of the project beneficiaries. Likewise, the consolidation and the institutionalisation process of the IPM-FFS methodology through the regional Bureau of Agriculture and the Amhara Regional Agricultural Research Institute is encouraging.