WILLINGNESS TO PRACTICE AGRICULTURE AS A CAREER AMONG AGRICULTURE UNDERGRADUATES IN KUMBOTSO L.G.A KANO STATE

This study focused on the willingness to practice agriculture as a career among agricultural undergraduates in Kumbotso Local Government Area of Kano state Data was collected from respondents through structured questionnaires and interviews. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics. From the results obtained, 75% of the respondents are males while 15% are females. 27% of respondents are within the ages of 22-31 years. 34.5% are married while 67.3% are single. The respondents preferred course of study before gaining admission into tertiary institution: 35 33% identified Agriculture related courses, 20 Pure Science related courses. 18.7% identified English. 17 identified Mathematics while 16% identified Geography as their preferred course of study before gaining admission into territory institution and currently all the respondent (100%) are studying agricultural related course namely. Agricultural economics, extension and rural sociology (32 30%), Animal science and fishery (24 22.4%). Crop science and biotechnology (21 19.6%), Soil science and environmental management (13 12.1%), Forestry and Wildlife (17 16%). 70 65.4% expressed their willingness to venture into agricultural related enterprise such as Crop production (47 44%) as the top choice while 37 34.5% expressed their unwillingness. It can be concluded that the top reason why respondents are willing to venture into agricultural enterprise is because of the available opportunities in the enterprise (28%) while their top reason of not willingness to venture into agricultural enterprise is because of the tediousness of the enterprise (32.7%). The study recommended that: Government should review its agricultural policies to the 21" century trends and standard which will make agriculture an attractive venture to the populace, Government should also increase its investment is agriculture through extension services through training and retraining of stakeholders for effective service delivery, Government should increase its investment in agriculture through creation of more research institutes and colleges and also sponsor researches that would bring about agricultural development, Government should also create a favourable environment for the investment of public private partnership in agricultural practices and implement policies that will lessen the difficulties faced by farmers/investors along the agricultural value chain, Government should increase its investment in agriculture through provision of modern tools and machineries which will reduce the stress and tediousness faced by people during agricultural practices, Government should provide soft loans and credit facilities to those interested in agriculture and ensure its proper utilization and finally Community heads and chief should complement government's effort by stimulating people's interest in agriculture via easy acquisition.