Abstract: This paper is part of a bigger research which aimed at assessing the financial costs and benefits of adopting World Health Organization’s (WHO’s) Farm Based Risk Reduction Measures (FBRRMs). The study focused on exploring the characteristics of the vegetable farmers and their farms and its influence on adopting FBRRMs and other acceptable farming methods. In all, the study considered a total of 148 vegetable farmers distributed proportionally across ten vegetable farming sites in Kumasi Metropolis. Qualitative and quantitative methods were employed complementarily in order to better explain the findings of the study. This study revealed that Metropolis farmers disregard potential health risk associated with wastewater and constantly use it for irrigation. Farmers (68 percent) “unintentionally” comply with FBRRM by using sedimentation ponds. This is even compromised as farmers step in sedimentation ponds to fetch water for irrigation. Analysis further shows that factors such as educational level of farmers, land tenure system, cost of adoption and among others are factors that determine vegetable farmers adoption of FBRRMs. The study concludes that effective monitoring of irrigation practices should be done by responsible institutions to ensure that acceptable standard of water is used for farming.
Keywords: Urban Agriculture; Kumasi; Farm Based Risk Reduction Measures; Farmers; Vegetables; World Health Organization.
Title: Adopting Farm Based Risk Reduction Measures in Developing Countries: An Assessment of Influential Factors in Kumasi Metropolis
Author: Nyantakyi Osei-Adu, Isaac Kwadwo Nkrumah
International Journal of Social Science and Humanities Research
ISSN 2348-3156 (Print), ISSN 2348-3164 (online)
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