Access to information on veterinary services among small ruminant farmers in Surulere Local Government Area, Oyo State

Abstract

The research was carried out to investigate access to information on veterinary services among small ruminants' farmers in Surulere Local Government Area, of Oyo State. The data was collected using formal questionnaires from 93 respondents. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The result from the study shows that majority (62%) of the respondent with majority (81.7%) being male within the age range between 20-49 years. Results on educational level of the respondents show that more than half of the respondents had former education with about 34.4% having ll-15 years of experience in the business and 32.3% having 6-10 years of experience. None of the socio-characteristic of the respondent has significant effect on the access to information on veterinary services by the respondents. Also, majority (75.3%) gets information on veterinary services through phone calls, 67.7% through radio advertisement while 66.7% of them regularly have a personal contact and interaction with veterinary doctor in the area. The result further shows significant correlation (P<0.05) between the source of information and access to veterinary service. The study however reveals that the major constraints to small ruminant farmers in the study area include low level of literacy (78.5%) and inadequate extension service being provided in the area (67%). In researching how accessible is veterinary service to small ruminant farmers in Surulere Local Government of Oyo State, 69.9% of the farmers considered vaccination to be a frequently accessible service while 58.8% of them opined that deworming service is frequently available in the area while only 44.1% believed that castration service in frequently available 43.0% says it is occasionally available. Therefore, the results of this study proves that while majority of the respondents were in their active age they need to be exposed to more formal education and that there is need to increase the presence of extension services in the study area.