Five academic staff from the Department of Agricultural Extension and Community Development had an opportunity to attend training on a new and advanced agricultural extension approach. The team attended Farmers Field and Business School (FFBS) training at FLOMI HOTEL in Morogoro for 4 days. The five academic staff who attended the trainng include Dr. Rasel Madaha, Dr. Joshua Kidudu, Dr. Mabebe Mtuva, Prof. Catherine Bengesi, and Ms. Joyce Mwakatoga. Training started on Monday of 17/04/2023 and lasted on Friday 20/04/2023. The training was facilitated by Dr. Maureen Miruka (Director of Strategic Partnerships and Research, Food and Water Systems at CARE USA, based in Nairobi Kenya) and David Manyonga (Farmer Field and Business School Advocacy Lead (Africa). The two facilitators work for CARE International.
The purpose of the workshop was to familiarize staff from Sokoine University of Agriculture, the local and Ministry of Agriculture (MoA), Ministry of Agriculture Transformation Institute (MATI), Local Government Authorities Iringa District Council, Iringa Regional Agriculture Advisor (RAA), Non-Government Organizations (MVIWATA, SAGCOT, ANSAF and ACT)[1] and CARE staff on the FFBS Approach. This was in a bid to ensure that CARE Tanzania’s Scaling up FFBS program partners are familiar with the FFBS model, planned implementation in Tanzania, it’s demonstrated benefits, and planned scale through the SUA and MoA training structures.
The familiarization workshop met the following specific objectives:
- Familiarize the workshop participants and increase their understanding of the foundations of FFBS, merits over the FFS, model success impact, data and evidence, FFBS Scale up plans and approach for Tanzania.
- To help government staff plan the adaptation and adoption of FFBS into the agriculture training curriculum.
- To ensure the research and academia partners have the necessary information for the inclusion of FFBS in the respective curriculum and facilitate the next steps on this initiative.
- Support CARE Tanzania and MoA to have a pool of FFBS trainers to help cascade the FFBS trainings to more team members, development agents and community-based frontline workers.
[1] MVIWATA = Mtandao wa vikundi vya wakulima Tanzania (Farmers Network in Tanzania); SAGCOT = Southern Agriculture Growth Corridor of Tanzania; ANSAF = Agriculture Non-State Actors Forum; ACT = Agriculture Council of Tanzania
