On 27-28 August 2018, a team of three trainers from the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and a staff of the National Agricultural Extension Research Liaison Service (NAERLS) held a training on policy communications in Minna, the capital of Nigeria’s Niger State.
The 18 (10 males, 8 females) participants of the training entitled Policy Communications for Advocacy, included farmer groups, extension agents, the state’s Agricultural Development Programme, agrodealers and community-based organizations.
The topics covered by the training included an introduction to policy communications, the use of social media, as well as sources of information on agriculture. There were also group exercises where participants were challenged to apply their new knowledge to solve problems.
Dr Bala Shehu, NAERLS’s Zonal Coordinator for the North Central Zone, also made a presentation on Intercultural Skills. Dr. Shehu who joined the IFPRI team in facilitating this training, has also been a participant of earlier trainings of Policy Communications given by the IFPRI team at Ahmadu Bello University.
This training is part of the activities of the Feed the Future Nigeria Agricultural Policy Project, which is jointly implemented by IFPRI’s Nigeria Strategy support Program (IFPRI-NSSP) and Michigan State University with funding from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID/Nigeria).