Environmental issues in relation to agricultural practices and attitudes of farmers: A case study from Saudi Arabia

PURPOSE: The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is continuously in search of environment-friendly farming practices since mass-scale agriculture was initiated. It is imperative to gauge to the level of awareness of the farmers on the agricultural practices causing environmental issue in order to devise new agricultural extension programs. This research aims to identify the attitudes of farmers towards agriculture and environment in Al-Ghat area of Saudi Arabia. METHODOLOGY: A simple random sample of 110 farms truly representing the farming community was drawn to meet the objectives of the study. Data were collected by using the pre-tested questionnaire during the face-to-face interviews. In order to understand the message of study, data were analyzed for percentages, arithmetic average and standard deviation in addition to the simple Pearson correlation coefficient. RESULTS: The results showed that the high proportion (87.3%) of farmers was interested in continuing to work farm and 77.3% of farmers did not consider adopting agriculture their main occupation. The findings of the survey reveal that some 55.5% of the respondent farmers were aware of the agricultural practices and their relation to the environment. Some 57.3% of the surveyed farmers are aware of potential benefits of enhanced utilization of agricultural organic wastes. However, main profession, farm employment (as the independent variables) showed a significant positive correlation with the attitudes of farmers towards their working in agriculture (as a dependent variable). Also a significant negative relationship between the educational levels and the attitudes of the farmers towards working in agriculture was noticed. The study also indicated a significant correlation between education and the degree of awareness of agricultural practices related to the environment and maximizing the optimum utilization of agricultural waste i.e. organic residues. CONCLUSIONS: The study suggested the need for new awareness and orientation programs to educate farmers and extension workers, highlighting the environment- friendly agricultural practices. Recommendation: There is need to offer incentives and facilities to keep the farmers stay in the farming business. Extension staff must keep educating them on beneficial features of organic farm waste and crop residues as organic fertilizers.