Over the past few years of Malawi has experienced
a shortage of food due to various reasons including
drought, excessive rains, and poor macro-economic
policy procedures. Integrated agriculture and aquaculture
(IAA) is said to improve farm resilience to
drought and farm diversification resulting in increased
whole-farm productivity, household income,
household food security and nutritional status of under-
five children (Jamu et aL, 2002). Hence, the Malawi
Department of Fisheries in collaboration with
the Japanese International Cooperation Agency
(JICA), and the World Fish Center, is encouraging
farmers adopt fish farming through IAA participatory
research and extension program.
While the benefits of IAA are manifold, Tshiunza et
a!. (2002) notes that "one way of determining the
success of an innovation is to assess the level and rate
of its adoption as well as the rate at which such an
innovation spreads among the target population!
area". It should be noted however, that in the early
stages of the spread of an innovation, extension workers
play a crucial role. On the other hand, extension
services may be more expensive than transmission of
a technology through farmer-to-farmer model.