ABSTRACT

The study sought to determine the relationship between vocational training and occupational performance of fish farmers in South-East, Nigeria. The study answered seven research questions and tested seven null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The study adopted correlational research design. The population of the study is 10,024 trained fish farmers from the 45 fishery vocational training centers in the area of study. The total sample for this study is 370, drafted using Krejcie and Morgan Table for sample size. Proportionate sampling technique with a sampling fraction of 0.037 was adopted to distribute the sample across the area. The instrument for data collection for the study were two sets of structured questionnaire titled “Level of Fish Farmers Vocational Training Questionnaire” (LFFVTQ) and “Fish Farmers Level of Occupational Performance Questionnaire” (FFLOPQ). The first instrument was structured on a four point rating scale of very high level of training-(4points), high level of training–(3points), low level of training–(2points), and very low level of training – (1point). The second instrument was structured in a four point rating scale of very high level of performance-(4points), high level of performance–(3points), low level of performance–(2points), and very low level of performance– (1point). The instruments were divided into parts A and B. Part A dealt with personal characteristics of the respondents while part B dealt with the items of research questions. The part B was divided into seven clusters in line with the research questions and had a total of 125 items. The instruments were validated by five lecturers, three in Agricultural Education, one from fishery and one from Measurement and Evaluation in Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike. The reliability of the instrument was tested by administering the instrument to 50 trained fish farmers in Cross River State. Their responses were collected and analyzed using Cronbalch alpha coefficient and a reliability coefficient of 0.82 and 0.79 were obtained. Data for the study were collected by the researcher and five research assistants. Three hundred and fifty five (355) copies representing 96% of the questionnaire were retrieved and analyzed while 15 copies were not retrieved. Data collected were analyzed using, Pearson’s product moment correlation coefficient for answering the research questions and simple linear regression for testing the null hypotheses. It was found from the study that: there is a very high positive relationship between vocational training and occupational performance of fish farmers in fish breeding, feeding, disease and pest control; there is a positive relationship between vocational training and occupational performance in planning, harvesting and processing of fish products while there is low/weak relationship between vocational training and occupational performance in fish marketing in South East, Nigeria. It was also found that there is a significant relationship between vocational training and occupational performance in all the hypotheses tested for the study. The study concluded that increase in level of training will lead to increase in performance but the proportion of increase varies across the different training clusters. Among the recommendations made were that farmers should acquire more vocational training in fish production from planning to harvest and processing as it has been established that the training relates highly to their occupational performance. Government and non-governmental organizations should establish more aquaculture vocational training institutions across South East Nigeria so that those who could not attend the formal school programme can attend vocational training since the training has been found to relate significantly to occupational performance in fish production occupation.