By farmers for farmers: exploring the process of peer learning in Papua New Guinea

Barbara PAMPHILON, Debbie Kapal, William Sirabis

Research output: Book/ReportCommissioned reportpeer-review

Abstract

Since the 1940s, education for agricultural development in Papua New Guinea (PNG) has been led by agricultural extensionists who typically share new practices and knowledge with farmers in a subject-centred way. Although more participatory practices, such as farmer field schools, have emerged in the last decade, the ‘technology transfer’ model that brings a body of knowledge to impart to farmers in a top-down way continues to be the dominant model in PNG. Today there is an increasing focus on farmer-centred approaches to agricultural extension however little is known about how learning is transferred farmer to farmer. This report is drawn from a small project that explored farmer-to-farmer learning in one highlands site. It was conducted by the University of Canberra’s (UC) Centre for Sustainable Communities as part of a large Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR) project Sustaining soil fertility in support of intensification of sweetpotato cropping systems (SLAM/2017/041).
Original languageEnglish
Commissioning bodyAustralian Centre for International Agriculrural Research
Number of pages40
Publication statusPublished - 8 Dec 2024

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