Newspaper Coverage of Agricultural Related Climate Change Issues (2020-2022)

Author: Chima-Nwosu, Erefaka Oriaku
Co-Author: Ifeanyi-Obi, Chinwoke Clara
Country : Nigeria
Subject : Agricultural Extension and Development Studies

Abstract
The aim of this research was to evaluate the coverage of agricultural related climate change issues in selected Nigerian newspapers within a three year study period (2020-2022). Purposive sampling was used to select three newspapers, Daily Sun newspaper, Punch newspaper and Vanguard newspaper for the study. Data for this study was collected from 216 daily publications which were also analyzed using the simple descriptive statistics and the following specific objectives were analysed using the simple descriptive statistics; to determine the volume of agricultural related climate change information reported, and to determine the category of newspaper article used in covering agricultural related climate change issues. Results showed only 0.53%, 1.56% and 1.95% coverage of agricultural related climate change issues in 2020, 2021 and 2022 respectively. The major category of newspaper articles used to report on agricultural-related climate change issues were feature articles with 7.60% while cartoons with 0% was the least category of newspaper article used in reporting agricultural related climate change issues. Additionally, a two-way ANOVA on the interaction between year of publication and the content categories on volume of coverage revealed F_calculated values of 87.826 at 1% significant difference, 67.921 at 1% significant difference, and 32.000 at 1% significant difference, respectively thereby indicating a strong positive correlation coefficient. It was however concluded that agriculture-related climate change issues received insufficient coverage in the three newspapers analyzed. It was recommended that Nigerian media must cover issues related to agriculture and climate change considerably because such issues are seen as important to the public to the extent that the media makes them appear to be.

Keywords: Agricultural news, Climate change, Newspaper, Vanguard, Daily Sun, Punch.