Hello there,
Glad that there is a bit of warmth here. Where is @Rosemary_Kowuor?
Meanwhile on WhatsApp:
Odongo Wendo Boniface Shine Fm: Are you aware that it’s only farmers who always listen to farmers program. This means that there is no need for any technique for them to since they also own program
Christian Maduka Ray Power Fm: It’s wrong to assume that only Farmers listen to Farmers’ Radio. In fact it’s 50-50. Any Farmers’ Radio listened is not it. A lot of people who are not farmers tune in to know what is going on in the agric sector or to learn new farming technique. A good content on Radio is a good content no matter who it is meant for.
Christian Maduka Ray Power Fm: Any Farmers Radio not listened to by other people is not fullfilling it’s target.
Principle Edimon Radio West: Ahhaaaaa really
Immaculate Leenat: I bet to differ on the point that only farmers listen to farmer programs
Emmanuel Asamoah Radio 1: We can also do workshops for the farmers and bring in the input dealers to make presentations and make the dealers pay an amount as support to show their products. They will be happy and push them to engage your station since they will get to know you have the numbers and their target
Sarah Mawerere UBC: You are right, it’s not only farmers who listen to farmer progs. When you go on air or broadcast any prog including farmer prog, bear in mind that it is listened to by the general public although the content is for a farmer. So other progs Like youth, gender, political …any prog can b listened to by general public though content packaged targets specific sections of the general public.
Odongo Wendo Boniface Shine Fm: Am also disagreeing with your point that we are in a setting where farmers normally contribute in the farm programme interms of call ins, and they are always available. But these other sections of people do not contribute to the expectation.
Calvin Jilala Shara Media: Unless you want to say farm or rather farming is only tilling the land,but if you take it to its totality farming incorporates cattle taming, poultry, gardening(agribusiness organic farming, et cetra) which does not necessarily need setting because it can be done both in rural and urban settings. And for your information I benefited much from the program on poultry.
Sarah Mawerere UBC: I don’t know who said about farmer call_ins here. But to add something to yo point, most farmers cannot call-in all the time. Reason they may have credit all the time. Normally a pre-recorded farmer prog is always good to combine all the variety we have said. Many people including farmers will listen in a recorded. But another format would be hosting live a Minister or extension worker to explain something. These can b hosted in the show- may b with a farmers’ group leader who will represent the farmers. The problem we have today, most presenters want live programmes for people to call in even in agric or farming program! A recorded one is better. Unless u are hosting may b Minister & an agro dealer then a farmer rep.
Immaculate Leenat: Pre-recorded is good but as we are graduating from the passive to active audiences, you can go live and still get the farmers on board especially where effective listener-clubs are instituted. members now meet to do the listening of the program and contribute through the phones of others within the group. That notwithstanding, focus groups discussions can still be held on issues to be tackled on air ahead of the live program so that farmers views can be captured. There will always be a way out when we go live, but more efforts, innovations and commitment is needed to meet expectations.
I think there are more techniques we can still employ on live programs that wouldn’t leave out a lot - testimonies, focus group discussions, vox pops, interviews, short stories etc are all formats or techniques if I may put it, we can employ.
Sarah Mawerere UBC: Yes, you can do recorded voices b4, edit them well, then do a live prog with others at the same time u slot in the recorded voices. We also do this. But I differ from u when u say a recorded prog is passive! It becomes passive without the ingredients. May b the facilitators will guide us more on this. Not very good prog has to b call in all the time!
Immaculate Leenat: I agree with your last sentence perfectly. But then passive as mentioned earlier here means that there can’t be contribution (with new developments and issues cropping up) at the time of airing the program. There isnt that active interaction between between the audience and resource persons/panelists.
+27 72 254 8109: I agree here. Prerecorded interviews are helpful. When you rely more on live guests or telephonic interviews anything might go wrong. The interviewee may not pitch or you may not get the person on phone…network problems etc. If you edit your interview well some listeners will not even notice it is prerecorded
Some people prerecord everything and just drop the program to play…for me this kinda blocks listeners from participating through call ins.
Immaculate Leenat: “Some people prerecord everything and just drop the program to play…for me this kinda blocks listeners from participating through call ins.” - and this explains my “passive” statement
Sarah Mawerere UBC: Yes i like yo contribution here too. But take it that not all progs have to b called in for any contribution. Also that not all farmer progs have to b recorded. Use all formats that u can.I have even tuned radio stations where a presenter invites callers to contribute on what they think immediately after his introduction of the prog .For a farmer prog is diff bearing in mind that many people find farming as a boring prog as we read in the resources & other contributions. If I went to a remote area & maize gardens have bn destroyed by the fall Army warm. I record the farmers who will explain how the warm manifests, the losses, the testimonies etc. I can interview the extension, then I can host a technical person live to tell them what to do but I slot in the recordings on army warm by farmers & extension. Extension are even in remote areas & can’t come to a far radio station but we record them. Whether call in or recorded, for this kind of problem is looking for solution. What I hate, is a situation where I open the line for anyone to call in…anyone in urban areas who can’t even suggest any meaning to the problem at hand. They can even just say; Mama play for me this song…
Petronillah Simwenyi: Most of the callings are for greetings and politics. What I do I visit farms with resource persons. Probably in forums. At times I record the resource person and split into episodes. At other times I invites farmers to ask question one at ago and be answered. I package the question answer program. Through this, others can also relate.
Immaculate Leenat: I love this but then I want to ask a question please - Do you know as the question-program is being aired, some listeners elsewhere at that moment may want to probe or make contributions to some of the points being made, at that point how does it happen?
I love pre-recorded especially when we are presenting a case/scenario from a community or on an issue but afterwards, some time is allocated either immediately after the program or the next edition for feedback from listeners. Making us digest the issues across board with urgency. I like the interactive session of the program more.
That is not to say I use my discretion to decide on the formats our programs take…, I’m just trying to point out the various formats and those I admire in the course of the work and why.
Golden MBUNDU: All a farmer needs is valid and adequate firsthand information. Am for the idea that we advocate for agriculture that will be free from political influence.
Sarah Mawerere UBC: Colleagues, I think we all have a point or points here. But who beats BBC, Voice of America, DW & China broadcasting services? They broadcast internationally & I don’t see or hear callers a part from like Shaka Ssali prog on Voice of America! Also, a good standard prog is not supposed to b too long. At least 30 minutes_ may b 45 depending on the station policy. How much time would one allocate the callers out of this time? There are mainly progs for calling in the way Petronillah said_ with agric or farming u need variety of voices but farmers are at the centre. So if the variety takes 35 minutes, when do u invite callers if u have recorded material? I said, record far distant people, bring in a technical person or NGO …whatever to ans qns from other callers. But belief me majority of farmers don’t call.
Golden MBUNDU: I also agree that prerecorded programs are better and more safe such that if well edited they sound real.
Sarah Mawerere UBC: Thank u for this point! Majority of farmers don’t call but listen a lot to their progs
Immaculate Leenat: We had an hour dedicated to our farming program, the only time we mostly discuss about issues of farming. I don’t think we can afford to always dedicate the whole time for prerecorded version as we had serial callers on standby to be part of the weekly program. This is because we could not reach out to all of them to in their respective communities as they wish. We also gathered that the challenges associated with farming differed from community to community. For our program, many farmers from the rural areas did fone in. That notwithstanding, our sponsors were really interested in the feedbacks probably the reason why it mattered much to us.
Immaculate Leenat: call-ins for “greetings and politics” mostly? ohk!
Immaculate Leenat: I must confess that I’m getting a lot new info on this area… Thanks for the insight!
Golden MBUNDU: You are straight to the point.all we need to do us pipo in farm radio business is to encourage more agriculture and livestock based radio stations that will be able to give a farmer 24/7 and 365 days a full platform which they can be able to tune in at anytime anywhere with everyone,not what we are experiencing where farm programs are aired and sometimes not in preference to a political programming.like in our case we are putting up a farmers network Radio which will be strictly a farmers market.
BBC and other international Medias were started by pipo like ourselves,we can also make it if we were to do away with copy cut kind of programming.
A radio platform that will be available for farmers talk 24/7 and 365 days.
Petronillah Simwenyi: I normally visit more often according to farmers demand. They normally plan for venue, drinks and sometimes I get fare back. For listeners who would like to ask questions, There is SMs, Facebook and twitter. I pick their numbers and call them with other lines. At the same time I call the resource person to attend to questions mostly outside the studio. Both questions and answers are synchronized for the next program. These program is called farmers voice. Being a vernacular station most people enjoy being heard and remembering other through salaams ( greetings)
Golden MBUNDU: Yes vernecular progress is more appealing to most of our target audiences and they yield positive results.
Immaculate Leenat: A community radio?
Catherine Apalat Mama Fm: I mean a radio station/network specifically looking at all round farmer radio programs…Great concept in the sense that the network becomes expert in Agriculture issues and also specialized Journalism which definitely in the long run attract revenue.
Golden MBUNDU: Thanks my dear. It’s a network radio for farmers market. What’s your suggestion?
Catherine Apalat Mama Fm: I find the network concept great!
Sarah Mawerere UBC: Wow… new good initiative! All the best.
Golden MBUNDU: Do you know why most farmers programs are politically engulfed.its bcoz most farmers feel cheated,swindled,tricked and dumped as result,they resort to politics to rest their anger.
Calvin Jilala Shara Media: I beg to differ a little bit for, I prefer live programs to recorded ones. And the reasons are simple, its more interactive than recorded programs amongst all players in the program including the presenter, extension officers, farmer on the field with all sound effects, q& a session, competition that is fought by all listeners(call ins, but the winner to be rewarded or rather awarded the next program. Some of those rewards are such as T-shirt, hats, baskets, pens etc bearing the logo and name of the program/ project. We fear to invite politicians to live interviews because it is very difficult to control them in case one or all become outrageous. The other advantage of live is instant, thus encourage the farmers to listen to the near end when an expert or experts wind up for a q&a session. However I respect other persons preferences for, I know have their own substantial reasons.
Ali Mubiru Radio Simba: Why have recorded programs? Recorded programs discourage innovation and research, integration of new developments and minimises interaction between the listener and the radio.
Lets encourage live programs but with a number of different radio formats.
I think each radio station here has a farmer’s program in its programming and like any other program its allocated its independent time and in like any other normal programming emergencies come in but with adjustments that are communicated through promos to cater for all
+27 72 254 8109: I believe you can mix. I contributed earlier that prerecorded interviews, not prerecorded whole programs. I am not on radio anymore but i still hear in some community radio stations a presenter would promise listeners that they will have So and so in the program talking about this. So and so do not pitch meaning now the presenter failed the promise and the program was empty as the presenter is not an expert himself.
In one instance, i listened to a program presented by a health worker, the program was about TB. It was so boring and sounded more like a lecture because there were no interviews ao using experts as presenters does not always work. It works better if there are interviews because the presenter will know what questions to ask and if the presenter is has a prerecorded interview, he can respond to people’s questions since he is an expert in the field too.
My take is …
Pure live shows do not always work, not to say they dont work at all. It is always a good idea to have back up in a form of a prerecorded interview that you can use if your guests do not arrive.
A promo cannot take the place of an interview
Yes live programming is exciting. Let us take a scenario where you are sponsored for a farmer program and you just depend on live programming. Your guests do not pitch and it means that program did not go as planned. What will you present to the sponsor? What proof do you have that the program happened? Remember you always have a plan and topics to cover. Why would that sponsor keep coming back if the quality is compromised?
One prerecorded interview wont hurt, even if you have your live guests you can still slot it in.
Ali Mubiru Radio Simba: Thanks for the feedback. That’s great but i have talked of different radio formats.
And I didnt mean the promo was to replace an interview but incase of a program change. Static programming isn’t the way to go. We should be flexible
This shouldn’t be an excuse in any way. It means the presenter wasn’t prepared. The presenter has to always communicate with the experts.
Then u can use a call out format. Prerecordings promote laziness
In my opinion If they can’t make it to studio u have experts u can call live on air and interact thru a phone call and have a live program
+27 72 254 8109: I agree. If you have different radio formats things will work out. I dont know about other areas, where i am it is possible to be in constant touch with your expert and they confirm they are on their way but they dont make it. A specific program is set for a certain time and you cannot say because your guest arrived late you will postpone the time…you will lose your followers. There are instances when you can’t even reach them on phone. At the same time we also have to understand that not all radio stations are well equipped to cater for clear telephonic interviews
Everyone knows what works for his or her area and we should just try our best to deliver to our listeners good quality that will also make the sponsors happy
Ismael Kasooha Vision Group: The beauty is mixing live and recorded material. This brings out both the interactiveness and humor of radio broadcasting.
Ali Mubiru Radio Simba: 
