Bringing knowledge to vegetable farmers through training videos: Effectiveness of entertainment videos vendors and agro inputs dealers in West Africa

Access to adequate knowledge and improved technologies is very crucial to improve farmers’ livelihoods. But a large number of farmers in West Africa remain outside the reach of extension services because of limited number of extension agents. As a growing number of rural households make daily use of movies/ music videos for entertainment and agro-input dealers make inputs more easily accessible to smallholder farmers, this study explores the role of the entertainment DVD vendors and agro dealers in disseminating agricultural information through training videos. Thus, we compiled a DVD with series of 9 growing vegetable videos in different local languages and provided to entertainment DVDs vendors and agro inputs dealers for selling in Benin and Mali. We also put a sticker with a phone number inside each DVD jacket, encouraging viewers to call for further question. As results, about 700 copies of DVD were sold within five months and people were contacting the researcher from Niger, Nigeria, Togo, Ghana and Burkina-Faso while the DVDs were only distributed in southern Benin and Mali. Clearly, the DVDs had ended up where people needed them. All had clearly understood the videos and about 64% of the people who bought the DVD actually called the phone number pasted into the DVD jacket to request more videos and drip irrigation equipment. Among the clients, we have farmers (58%), officials and business men/women (27%), researchers and students/students’ parents (11%), farmers’ organizations, NGOs and agricultural extension workers (4%). They are eager to pay for videos with a variable price from $1 to $9 per DVD while an ordinary imported entertainment video is sold at $1. This study provides substantial evidence that training video dissemination through commercial channels can be particularly effective when done via private sector and based on people’s need.