Analysis of the Barriers to Effectiveness of Agricultural Extension Courses in Kermanshah Province

This study was conducted with the aim of analyzing the barriers of extension courses held in Kermanshah province. The research was an applied and exploratory study in terms of typology of research methodologies. The statistical population of this study included farmers of Kermanshah province participating in the extension courses of Agricultural Jihad Organization. Data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire whose content validity was confirmed by a number of agricultural extension and education and rural development experts and its reliability was confirmed by Cronbach's alpha coefficient (all alpha coefficients were greater than 0.85). In order to identify and summarize the barriers of effectiveness of extension courses, exploratory factor analysis was performed through IBMSPSS21. Furthermore, a confirmatory factor analysis using LISREL8.5 was used to confirm the extracted barriers. The results showed that the barriers to the effectiveness of extension courses in Kermanshah province can be summarized in five general factors explaining about 70% of the changes in the dependent variable. "Inconsistency of courses' content with farmers' time and needs" was recognized as the most important obstacle of the effectiveness of courses and "lack of positive attitude towards extension agents and farmers", "lack of farmers' participation in planning extension courses", "employing out of date and unprofessional trainers", and "weak management and quality control of extension courses" were characterized as the other important barriers to the effectiveness of extension courses, respectively. According to the results, it is recommended that the quality of the content of extension courses’ be reevaluated and promoted annually. Hence, their participation in planning process of extension courses should be more seriously considered in order to be more consistent with the needs of farmers.