Preparing students for agricultural employment in sub-Saharan Africa

There is an increasing need for universities to produce graduates with strong technical skills, practical experience in their areas of specialization, ability to work with rural smallholder farmers and yet with broad development perspectives. One of the ways in which the Regional Universities Forum for Capacity Building in Agriculture (RUFORUM) is filling this gap is through the Field Attachment Program (FAPA). The FAPA grants are awarded to students who have completed or just about to complete their theses study. The FAPA provides funding to enable students go for 3-6 months attachment to the communities where they conducted their research, so that they give feedback and design follow-up activities. It is also used to support attachment to industry, farmer organisations, research institutions, etc. This paper shares experiences from the last five years of the program. The information shared is drawn from data and analysis from review of individual progress implementation reports submitted by the awardees. From 2010 – 2015, RUFORUM under its Competitive Grants Scheme (CGS) awarded 148 FAPA grants to its funded graduate students. A synthesis of the data reveals that the RUFORUM FAPA has enhanced student skills and capacity to engage with communities. Students indicated that they acquired field-based experience of working at community level as well as opportunity to transfer knowledge to farmers, and other stakeholders. In addition, students reported that farmers were very impressed that the field attachment enabled students to go back to the communities where they had conducted their research and shared and disseminated their research findings. Based on this feedback, the FAPA has achieved its set objectives. The Award offers an effective mechanism to skilling graduates and preparing them for the labor market while at the same time linking farmers to research outputs for which they engaged as part of participatory action research. The FAPA process therefore provides a mechanism of how university-based research teams can effectively engage and prepare graduates for future work. Interest in FAPA has increased over the years as demonstrated by the increased number of applications. It is recommended that the FAPA be institutionalized by universities as a mechanism of facilitating both graduate and undergraduate students to participate in community activities while enhancing their practical skills.