Strategic advertising for enhanced agri-business development in Abia State, Nigeria

Farmers in Nigeria face dual problems of achieving high level of productivity and handling of surplus yield. Advertising, a high-intensity consumer information medium, facilitates the latter. It is against this background that this study ascertained the prevailing mode of advertising goods and services in Abia State, analyzed advertising trend or focus, as well as advertisement rates in selected national newspapers for a period one month. Observation, document analysis and interview techniques were adopted for data collection. A variety of advertising media were identified, including poster campaigns and signposts, use of alluring words and designs on products, and peculiar sound effect from itinerant service providers. Signposts and billboards were extensively used to indicate business location and purpose, while paper posters were used largely for announcement of upcoming events. Advertisement messages were highest in The Guardian Newspapers and least in The Sun newspapers during this period. The agricultural sector was not as widely advertised as the Finance, Telecommunication and Automobile sectors. Advertisement rates were high, and ranged from N2000, for classified adverts, to over a million naira for centre spread adverts. The paper recommends that farmers imbibe the culture of aggressive and strategic promotion of their products as part of agribusiness initiative and development strategy in Nigeria