Effectiveness of Farmer Groups: Roles of Farmer Contact Resources and Field Agriculture Extension in Bengkulu Province, Indonesia

Limited field agricultural extension services hinder productivity. Farmers struggle to achieve optimal yields without sufficient technical support, threatening national food security. This study aimed to develop a model for evaluating the effectiveness of farmer groups in Bengkulu Province, Indonesia. This study involved a population of 220 individuals from eight farmer groups located in the South Seluma Sub-district, Seluma Regency. A survey was conducted with 142 members of farmer groups in Seluma District, selected using simple random sampling. The validity test used had two parts: factor validity and discriminant validity. Structural Equation Model (SEM) was applied to the collected data to develop models that identified the relationships among factors related to agricultural extension performance, farmer contact resources, and the effectiveness of farmer groups. The results indicate that the effectiveness of farmer groups was positively related to the farmer contact resources. However, this was negatively influenced by the performance of agricultural extension services, which faced issues such as limited access, low managerial competency, and fewer business opportunities. The model showed that farmers in the study area were more open to Farmer Contact Resources than to Field Agricultural Extension. Furthermore, enhancing the quality of human capital in agricultural extension services is essential to improving the effectiveness of farmer groups. This can be accomplished by enhancing managerial skills, providing market-oriented training for agricultural extension, and increasing the ratio of agricultural extension to farmers.