Abstract

Since the inception of the Department of Fisheries’ Aquaculture Program (AP) in 1994, the participation rate of marron farmers in Western Australia has grown 227% from 120 to 273. Despite this, marron farmers have not adopted best practice farming methods with the average marron farm producing approximately 139kg/ha/yr, compared to industry best practice of 2200kg/ha/yr. From this analysis the traditional extension model used has not been effective in improving individual production only changing the aspirations of farmers and, as such, places the industry’s annual production target of 200t by 2010, at threat. Therefore the AP required a new extension model.

Strategic Extension Campaigns (SEC) provides a holistic participatory approach to extension delivery with an emphasis on effectiveness and efficiency in service delivery. The SEC methods, as developed by Ronny Adhikarya, consists of a cycle of 10 operational phases, that ensure activities are carried out in a systematic, sequential and process-orientated manner. SECs achieve a customer focus, by differentiating farmers into homogenous groups and applying an appropriate, field trailed, extension services to meet their specific needs. The planning and implementation of the SEC took place from 30 September 2002 to 15 December 2002. The marron SEC focussed on new farmers and involved implementing a roadshow aimed at assisting new farmers to take action to determine whether or not marron aquaculture was feasible for them. The marron SEC prime objective was to build the capacity of new entrant marron farmers so they could increase the area of best practice marron farms in Western Australia by 20ha in 3 years (2005).

The interim results indicate that marron SEC workshops appear to be a success with the participants stating that their expectations were met and that the workshop had resulted in them increasing their knowledge and taking specific actions. The post workshop survey found that 50% plan not to enter into the industry, and those that plan to continue will implement a total of 42-57 ha of marron ponds in the next three years. In this case, the workshop series will have met the marron SEC’s objective of 20ha. In addition, the SEC framework will have assisted in achieving nearly 56 to 76% of production required to meet the AP goal of a 200t marron industry by 2010, assuming that all the farms are managed at industry best practice and can achieve 2200kg/ha/yr. This is being monitored as part of this SEC’s longer term, summative evaluation.

Keywords

Strategic, extension, campaign, marron, aquaculture, market and action learning cycle.

Introduction

In Western Australia participation in the marron aquaculture sector dominates the State’s aquaculture industry with 273 of the 480 aquaculture licences issued by the Department of Fisheries being for marron aquaculture and marron farming accounting for approximately 560 ha of ponds under cultivation. Predominately, this industry takes place in South West of Western Australia.

The industry participants have been drawn to the marron sector for some of the following reasons:

• World decline in supply of large freshwater crayfish;
• Luxury/gourmet/niche product status;
• High Value;
• Australia is the only significant producer;
• Few disease problems;
• Requires simple, well understood production technology;
• Low operating costs;
• Modest amounts of water needed;
• Can be integrated to other farming activities; and
• Researchers & some farmers can obtain high yields.

For these reasons the Department of Fisheries has invested in research and extension programs since the 1980’s. However, despite these reasons for investment and the provision of extension support, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from marron aquaculture production has remained relatively static (Figure 1, Department of Fisheries 2002).

Figure 1: Production figures for Western Australian marron sector over the financial years 1997/98 to 2001/02.

A closer examination of farmer productivity estimates average farm production is 139kg/ha/year that equates to gross income of $3197/ha/yr. In contrast, best practice marron farms that yield 2200kg/ha/yr, equating to a gross income of $50,600/ha/yr. This indicates that current best farming practices are not being adopted. The poor adoption by participants highlights that the AP extension practices have not been effective. The non-adoption of best practice farming puts at risk the 2010 production target of 200t, but of more concern, the potential income from marron farming could enable a typical South Western Australian farm to become profitable and increase annual farm income. As the average South Western Australian farm’s annual profits and total cash income are -$12,477 and $39,645 respectively (ABARE 2003). As such, it was important for the AP to develop a new extension program based on current extension best practice.

Taking Stock

The AP’s extension practices involve the publication of technology pamphlets, information seminars, Webpages and provision of technical assistance; with the only measure of effectiveness being the number of contacts or attendees and the growth in Gross Domestic Product (GDP). These outputs are typical of a transfer of technology extension model that Jiggins (1993) states are typified by the following:

• Centred on the need to communicate information about technology;
• Largely based on the assumption that the communication of information of research results will lead to behaviour change in the recipients of the information;
• Not usually been designed as part of a process to achieve specific practice changes;
• Been administered by applying project and program management principles that originate from the disciplines of manufacturing and engineering; and
• Not embrace the principles of capacity building in thinking, skills, systems thinking and continuous improvement and innovation. (Jiggins 1993).

This model appears not to have altered practices in the marron aquaculture sector. Since the use of the transfer of technology extension model there has been an evolution of other extension models, such as Farmer First, Farming Systems Research/Extension, Resources Model of Extension and Participatory Action Management. Each model attempts to improve on the apparent weakness of the others. Fell et al (1998) suggests that the 90’s model of extension should embrace all models to tackle the gambit of extension projects. The complexity of the situation and the level of participation required will affect which model is chosen. (Figure 2). However, whilst it is reassuring to have a range of extension models to choose from, ‘best practice’ use of any model is not assured unless the specific problem being addressed through the project is well defined. As such, it would be useful to have a conceptual framework to embed the 90’s models within, as without it, there is risk of focusing on the outputs and not the understanding customers problems and finding the solution(s).

Figure 2: the 90’s model of Extension (from Fell et al 1998)

It is important to that a conceptual framework guides the extension planning process in a systematic, rational and strategic manner (Adhikarya 1994,1997). A good conceptual framework can help in the application of relevant theories, principles or research findings in the planning and development of sound extension strategies and plans.

Over the years many planning frameworks have developed, for example the Participatory Problem Solving (PPS, Anon), Change Analysis Framework (CAF, Clarke et al 1997), Strategic Extension Campaign (SEC, Adhikarya 1978 cited in Adhikarya 1994, 1997). But as Adhikarya (1994,1997) states

“the effectiveness of an extension program depends on its strategy which should be specific, systematic, and well-planned”.

It is this strategic focus that appeared useful to the AP, especially with Pareto’s Law (80/20) always in operation i.e. there is a need for AP to focus on key areas that will deliver the greatest and most effective results, especially with reduced resources. Hence the appeal of Adhikarya’s (1994,1997) framework for a strategic extension campaign (SEC) planning which is defined as:

“A strategically planned, problem-solving, and participatory- oriented extension program, conducted in a relatively short time period, aimed at increasing awareness/knowledge level of an identified target beneficiaries, and altering their attitudes and/or behaviour towards favourable adoption of a given idea or technology, using specifically designed and pre-tested messages, and cost-effective multi-media materials to support its information, education/training, and communication intervention activities.”

Methods

SEC process is based on a 10-phase circular model that is divided into two major parts. The first part is the process of strategy development planning. The second part is the process of management planning. For details refer to Adhikarya’s (1994, 1997), noting that AP modified the sequence of the SEC phases by inserting Phase 4: Audience Analysis and Segmentation before Phase 2: Objective formulation. As such the resultant sequence of phases was 1, 4, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 (Figure 3). This corresponded to AP desire to ensure that the customer was prominent in planning to ensure a specific market focus.

Another modification was undertaken in Phase 6. The Pre-test was conducted as a role playing exercise with key research staff and training providers due to the two and half month time frame of the marron SEC idea to implementation. To ensure a customer focus each of the 11 participants were asked to role-play the likely specific customer types. In addition, we undertook a pre-workshop survey to check the customer’s expectations.

Figure 3 Modified Conceptual Framework used in Marron Strategic Extension Campaign

Results

The planning, development and implementation of the SEC project took place from 16 September 2002 to 3 December 2002.

Phase 1: Technical & problems identification and information needs assessment

Table 1: Summary of the Knowledge, Attitudes and practice (KAP) survey key findings undertaken at Pemberton and Shenton Park Open Days and intra-departmentally.

Identified Problems in Adoption of Best Practice Marron Aquaculture Poor site selection Poor pond design Poor pond construction No aeration or poor aeration systems No anti-predator management systems Cutting corners in set up and operation Under Capitalisation Desire to innovate, and not follow proven production methods. Failure to understand semi-intensive versus extensive production systems Limited time availability, clashes with core business. Just wish to do something on unproductive land – hobby or low expectations. Something is better than nothing”. Unrealistic expectations – no understanding of production system or biological requirements of the animal. Limited understanding of capital and operational costs involved. Possible Numeracy and literacy barriers to improving knowledge and skills. No easy to follow guide to set up (Marron Manual out of publication) No one there to provide guidance.

Phase 2: Audience Analysis and segmentation

The ADO and Research team divided the WA marron aquaculture industry into four customer groups, broadly based on production levels:

“Lifestylers” (production/experience/income meets expectations and/or needs)

Growers producing less than 1000kg/ha/yr (production does not meet expectations and/or needs)

Growers producing greater than 1000kg/ha/yr but less than 2200kg/ha/yr (production does not meet expectations and/or needs)

Potential New entrants (latent 2200kg/ha/yr) (want to enter the industry sector)

Each of the four customer groups has a differing potential to contribute to the new production target. This contribution needed to be determined to evaluate whether to invest in an Extension Campaign for the specific customer group and what form that campaign would take.

The results indicate that new entrants have the highest relative message effectiveness (ME) score of 23.5 compared with 6.75, 6.33 and N/a for growers producing less than 1t per year, growers producing greater than 1t per year, and “lifestylers” (Table 2).

Phase 3: Objectives formulation

For new entrant marron farmers to increase the area of best practice marron farms in Western Australia by 20ha in 3 years (by 2005).

To assist under-resourced farmers to make the decision not to invest in marron aquaculture.

For new entrant marron farmers to become ‘network’ marketers for the Extension messages that is, to talk to 20 people in the first 12 months on fundamentals of the feasibility of marron aquaculture.

Table 2: Potential Message Effectiveness Assessment for extension customer group (Ranking system: 0 = lowest –5 = highest)

		“Lifestylers”	Growers producing less than 1t	Growers producing greater than 1t	New entrants
Efforts	Group Business Expectations being met?	0	3	3	5
	Extension Program?	0	1	1	1
	Barriers to adoption	0	4	3-4	2-3
	AP Resources required (Negative)	0	-4	-3	-2
Total		0	4	4.5	6.5
Rewards	Realistic Production Increase Potential	0 t/year	24 t/yr	25 t/year	Unlimited 60-70 ha of best practice farms required to produce 148 t/year
	Cost recovery potential	0	3	3-4	5
Total		0	27	28.5	153
Potential Message Effectiveness (Total Reward/total Effort)		N/A	6.75	6.33	23.5
Priority		4	2	3	1

Phase 4: Strategy Development and Information positioning

The central issues or problems that impede achieving marron SEC objectives is that new entrants do not know how to assess the business opportunity that marron aquaculture offers. The key problems that new entrants are seeking solutions to were identified as:

Table 3: Summary of the key underlying impediments to the adoption of best practice marron farming.

New entrants
Impediments to taking Action	SEC Solutions
New entrants take the idea and implement without first assessing the market, financial and production feasibility and match with their specific resources (time, money, water, land etc). In fact the primary concern is can I produce them?
This is because the answers are complex ie. no easy pathway to follow to make decisions? Problems that customers need answers to: Is there a market for marron? How much do they cost to produce? What resources do I need to aquaculture marron? Where to go to check my thinking? How do keep organised? How much time will it take?	Participatory and training based Model (Figure 2: 90’s Model) Market information on marron Financial Decision support tools Checklists & support information Follow up File System, e-group. Time Management

The marron SEC needed to be positioned in local areas that have marron growing potential. Focus in prime marron growing areas from Esperance to Geraldton, especially Great Southern, South West and Peel Harvey regions.

Phase 5: Multi-media Selection

Assessing the viability of any business is a complex process involving three stages:

1. The opportunity (back of the envelop) study;

2. The feasibility study; and

3. The viability (Business Planning, pilot) study.

Due to this complexity there was a need for the marron SEC product to be participatory and build the capacity of customers to assess the viability of marron farming. (Fell et al 1998; Figure 2). Given that most customers would have undertaken an opportunity study, the marron SEC needed to ensure that all customers could investigate production, market and financial feasibility of marron aquaculture. This approach was considered to have customer appeal since farmers prefer training that meets their particular needs at a particular time (RIRDC, 1999).

Given that the elements of the feasibility study are known and repeatable, and that dealing with individual customers is repetitive and time consuming. The marron SEC team, decided that group and interpersonal communication media would be the most cost effective. As such the Marron SEC extension vehicle was a seminar-come- facilitated workshop based on an action learning cycle. The action learning cycle (ALC) refers to the model put forward by Kolb (1984) who stresses the need for the cycle to be completed to maximise the adult learning experience. The cycle involves four steps: plan, act, reflect and conclude.

The SEC team wanted to ensure that as part of the workshop the participants would be able to build new networks, which would provide peer support and increase the social capital of the customers that decided to invest in the industry. On this basis the SEC team insured that the workshop process took one day and contained breakout sessions, icebreakers and meals. Also this process enabled the customers to build relationships with ADO’s, as the goal of any extension program is to get and keep a customer. The SEC team also catered for different learning styles and perceptual modalities (Wislock, 1998) through the presentation techniques listed in Table 4.

Presentation technique	Learning style	Perceptual modality
Learner resource file	Reflector, theorist	Visual
Contact list and decision support tree	Reflector, theorist	Visual
Presentations with PowerPoint overheads	Reflector, theorist, pragmatist	Audio and visual
Group activities	Activist, pragmatist	Kinaesthetic

Table 4: How the SEC team catered for different learning styles and preferred perceptual modalities.

An observation, reflection, interpretation and decisional (ORID) discussion was held at the end of each workshop to take participants through the action learning cycle and encourage them to reflect on the information they received, interpret what it means to them and make a decision on the next steps to take.

Phase 6: Message design, Development, pre-testing and materials production

Message design and Development

The aim of the workshop delivered as part of the marron SEC was to enable customers to make decisions and take actions that would allow them to decide whether or not marron aquaculture is feasible for them.

The information needs:

• How do I grow them? Production feasibility – natural and financial resources required;
• Who will buy them? Markets and marketing feasibility – product quality (ask industry to deliver);
• Can I make money? Financial feasibility; and
• Does it blend with my current business activities?

At the end of the day the SEC team needed to meet the following customer learning objectives:

• Explain site requirements for marron farming
• Know how to collect the necessary information to determine site suitability
• Undertake Break-even analysis: fixed and variable costs
• Estimate the capital and operational costs for a particular size farm
• Impact of Discounting on the marron aquaculture business
• Understand the Marron Supply Chain
• Explain current markets and recent trends in the marron market
• Understand product quality issues
• Determine whether or not they have the required time available for marron farming
• Decide whether or not marron farming fits with their current business objectives
• Decide whether or not they wish to pursue the idea of marron farming and
• Make a decision, plan and take action.

Each learning objective was “packaged” in an action learning cycle as follows:

Informal Seminar (Visual Power Point &/or video)		Exercise with participants		Workshop		Learner Resource File with section dividers		ORID Decision		Action Planner
ALC 1										ALC 2
Plan Context: emphasis on Partnering with new entrants to reach a common goal of successful, well planned, business growth.		Act in a safe environment		Reflect		Support Information to aid the Reflection process.		Conclude		Plan

For each topic a seminar presentation was made, an interactive exercise was done and a facilitated ORID discussion conducted, resulted in the writing of action in action planner.

As Figure 4 shows the intent was to integrate the SEC customers Action learning cycles so that the decisions/action plan made once implemented will feed into the SEC workshop.

Pre-test

The following feedback from the pre-test was that:

• A 50:50 balance between seminar and workshops needed to change to 80:20, as the clients are predominately seeking knowledge.
• Radar chart questions needed to better reflect the actual topics being covered in the presentations and activities. The field trial radar chart showed a decrease in knowledge.
• That two extra tools were needed to assist participants make decisions to take action

Marron Aquaculture Decision Support Tree (see Author for a copy); and

Contact list for services, assistance and advice.

Figure 4: Schematic Diagram indicating the basic action learning cycle undertaken through the SEC I campaign (Legend: Black = SEC I, Grey = SEC II).

As such the SEC packaging needed to be amended to include these elements:

Informal Seminar (Visual power Point & Video)

Exercise with participants

Workshop

Decision Support Tree & Contact lists

Learner Resource File with section dividers E-group

ORID Decision

Action Planner

ALC 1

ALC 2

Plan Context: emphasis on Partnering with new entrants to reach a common goal of successful, well planned, business growth

Act in a safe environment

Reflect

Reflect

Support Information to aid the Reflection process.

Conclude

Plan

As such the Strategy Development and Information positioning needed to be altered to reflect this new understanding of the customer needs (Table 5).

Table 5: Revised Summary of the key underlying impediments to the adoption of best practice marron farming.

New entrants
Impediments to taking Action	SEC Solutions
Problems that customers need answers Is there a market for marron? How much do they cost to produce? What resources to I need to aquaculture marron? What do I need to first in assessing if marron farming is for me? Where to go to seek services? Where to go to seek assistance? Where to go to seek advice? Where to go to check my thinking? How do keep organised? How much time will it all take?	Market information on marron Financial Decision support tools Checklists & support information List of contacts List of contacts List of contacts Follow up SEC I workshop & List of Contacts File System, e-group. Time Management

Pre-workshop Survey

The response rate was 100%. The key information requirements were capital and operation costs and water quality requirements (Table 6).

Table 6: Ranked information needs (1 = highest, 8 = lowest)

Topic	Rank	Topic	Rank
Soil types	4.1	Marketing	4.7
Topography	4.4	Business Planning	4.8
Water Quality	3.8	Capital & operating Costs	3.6
Water Budgets	5.5	Integration into an existing enterprise	5.8

Materials production

All presentations, exercises answers and additional technical support information were included in a Learner Resource File (LRF) as reference material. The LRF was to assist the ‘decision making, action planning and implementation’ process plus was designed to assist participants in sharing the information with their peers. The rationale as indicated by social research that farmers learn best from other farmers (FRDC 2002). Therefore the SEC team thought that this would provide another mechanism to assist the Department in achieving the aims of the marron SEC.

The entire workshop process: the agenda, presentations, lesson plans, worksheets and learning resources were also catalogued. This should allow further marron SEC workshops to be conducted without considerable effort in planning and preparation by AP extension staff.

Phase 7: Management Planning

The Marron Road Show SEC team collectively developed a Gantt Chart of the tasks and subtasks required. This was transcribed to Microsoft Project™ and each member was provided with a copy. The SEC Project Manager ensured that the Project Concept received budget approval and that regular scheduled production meetings and informal meetings took place so that any bottlenecks were overcome or new tasks were included in the project plan.

Phase 8: Staff Training

As the marron SEC team were already aquaculturists and experienced extension professionals no training was required. However, the marron road show needed to acquire extra financial and business planning skills to the team. The SEC decided to contract a consultant to provide this section of the Roadshow. The terms of reference for the appointed consultant ensured that they t had knowledge and experience with training and small group facilitation.

Phase 9: Field Implementation

The plan was to hold five workshops with 30 people each from 3 to 9 December 2002. However, presales were poor. Consequentially the SEC team rationalised the venues down to three. The end result was 71 people participated from 90 places offered.

Phase 10: Process Documentation and summative evaluation

The tool used for the pre workshop evaluation was a learning expectations survey combined with a “radar chart” to assist participants assess the gaps in their knowledge specific to marron aquaculture (Figure 5).

Two weeks after each workshop each participant received a written survey in the mail. The purpose of this was to ascertain whether in hindsight the workshop was valuable, if information was being shared and if specific actions were being taken.

Post workshop Evaluation

The results of the SEC workshop are summarised in Table 7.

Figure 5. Radar Charts used by SEC customers to assess the impact of the workshop on increasing their knowledge in 8 key areas (green dots = before, orange = after).

Table 7: summary of the medium term post workshop summative survey.

Measure	Outcome
Client Satisfaction	43.7% Survey Response Rate: Survey indicated that 100% would recommend the workshop. 87% shared information with friend or family. Increased Knowledge (Figure 5)
Estimate of best practice marron farm to be implement by marron SEC customers.	An estimate of 17.2 to 57.6 ha of pond are to be implemented in the next 1-3 years.
Number of workshop participants deciding that they do not have the resources to enter into marron aquaculture.	35 customers indicated that they would not proceed. Total saving to the State of approximately $85,000 per farmer assuming that each farmer had the potential of implementing a minimum of 1 ha of ponds, plus the extension and government administration costs. This value could be increased if the negative public perception impact resulting from under resourced new entrants that would result in poorly performing enterprises were accounted for.

Discussion

The interim results appear to indicate that the marron SEC workshops have resulted in meeting its objectives in the first round workshops with a summative evaluation indicating that our customers plan to implement a total of 17-57 ha of marron ponds in the next three years. Another plus was that the SEC customers stated that their expectations were met and that the workshop had resulted in them increasing their knowledge and taking specific actions. Overall the marron SEC will have assisted in achieving nearly 56 to 76% of production required to meet the industry target of 200t per annum, assuming that all the farms are managed at industry best practice and can achieve 2200kg/ha/yr. This result has exceeded the marron SEC team’s expectations. However, the long term impacts needs to be assessed as part of a longer-term summative evaluation program. Also as SEC customers implement and manage their farms new marron SEC products will need to be developed to meet their evolving needs as they move to maximising their chance of achieving their marron aquaculture business goals.

The unexpected and strong interim results were borne from the SEC conceptual framework which assisted the SEC team to apply relevant theories and principles or research findings in the development of marron roadshow product. The key element however is the strategic customer focus of the SEC conceptual framework and the use of knowledge, attitude and practices (KAP) survey, pre-testing and summative evaluation to provide support information. This support information is instrumental in developing the right product for the specific customer.

Theodore Levitt, leading US Professor of Marketing, (1986) said that if you are not thinking segments you are not thinking. The segmentation of the customers will always assist in developing better and more effective extension products, as the extension officers will better define the problems of homogenous customer groups that:

• Allows the development of better decision-making products that are based on identified needs rather than perceived needs; and
• Creates a culture “how can I help my customer make a decision?”, or ask the question “is what are the blockages preventing a decision to be made?”

Conclusion

All the SEC elements discussed in this paper will assist the AP in understanding their customers’ problems, refining existing extension tools, and developing new SECs for other sectors of the aquaculture industry. It is on this basis that the marron SEC team recommends that other extension practitioners investigate using the SEC framework.

References

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Anon. (?) Extension Project Management for Complex problems. Chapter 5 in Sustainable Beef. QPDI, Indoorpilly, Queensland Australia.

Clarke R, Fell D, Timms J & Coutts J (1997) A framework for the design, management and evaluation of Extension processes. Proceedings 2^nd APEN Conference Albury, NSW pp621-627.

Fell R, Clark R, Easdown W & Mobbs R (1998) Extension – dealing with diversity, coping with Change. Address to Rural Extension Centre, UQ Gatton.

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