Assessment of the specialized course on rice seed production and extension methods for food security

This study looks at the effectiveness of an 8-week training course as perceived by agriculture professionals from Africa and the Philippines, who were nominated to participate in the course. The assessment focuses on the case of the Specialized Course on Rice Seed Production and Extension Methods (RSPE) when it was first launched in 2017. Generally, the study aimed to analyze the participants' satisfaction of the course in terms of its content, methods, duration, trainers, facilities, and management. Moreover, the study also sought to assess the change in the participants' knowledge and skills on rice seed production and extension before and after the course together with their behavior after it. Following a case study and descriptive research design, the researcher conducted a survey with 19 Africans and Filipinos who participated in the course, and interviewed one Program Manager, one Training Coordinator, 18 Resource Persons, and seven Facilitators. The course was perceived by participants to be mostly either very satisfactory or satisfactory, except for two aspects that were somewhat satisfactory for them. These were duration and content that focuses on the activities helping the participants to develop specific skills or competencies. Before participating in the course, their level of knowledge and skills were mostly moderate in all of the components of the PalayCheck System. These components included seed quality and variety selection, land preparation, crop establishment, nutrient management, water management, pest management, harvest management, and extension and technology transfer. After the course, they rated their level of knowledge as mostly high, except for crop establishment which they rated as very high. Conversely, they also perceived their level of skill to be mostly high in all of the components of the PalayCheck System, except for harvest management which was very high. When it comes to their change in behavior after the course, they reported it was more in all of the components of the PalayCheck System. There has been very little progress though when it comes to accomplishing their re-entry plans and several suggestions may need to be considered to help them implement their re-entry plans. One of these is that the kind of support they need may have to be identified when interviewing participants during the nomination and selection process and that their proposed re-entry plans can be discussed based on an assessment of their in-country technical capacity needs, if possible. Ideally, it will be helpful to have a training needs analysis first to make sure that the RSPE fits their backgrounds, experiences, or needs in terms of training duration or the activities that will help them to develop specific skills or competencies. If the African participants also have specific needs either for training or implementing their re-entry plans that can't be satisfied if the RSPE is done outside of Africa then the managers of the course can consider doing an in-country training in the future.