75 Ways to Fix Your Farmer Programme

Farm Radio International has published a list of tips for broadcasters who want to improve their farmer programmes. According to the authors, radio, more than any other medium, speaks the language of farmers and farmers count on radio to provide them with the information they need, when they need it. Farmers also want radio to include them in discussions of how best to grow the crops that feed their families, and how to make some money at the market. Too often, however, radio lets farmers down as it does not contain the information they need and the information is given by professors, politicians, and agricultural product promoters - not by farmers themselves.

In 2010, Farm Radio International gathered information about farmer radio programmes from radio stations in Cameroon, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Malawi. They visited twenty stations and two production houses and listened to their farmer programmes. They posed hundreds of questions to the people making the programmes and to the people listening to them. This set of tips stems from their findings, to help broadcasters improve their farmer programmes. The document is divided into three chapters:

• Quick fixes
• Middle-sized improvements
• The big stuff