Awareness of information resources as a correlate of socio-economic empowerment of undergraduate students of Agriculture in Federal Universities in North-Central Nigeria

Abstract

This research work studied five federal universities in the North central state of Nigeria including the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The study sought to investigate the awareness of information resources as correlate of socio-economic empowerment of undergraduate students of agriculture in federal universities in north-central, Nigeria. The population of the study is 20,348 students. Descriptive research design was adopted for the study. The study was guided by three research objectives. Questionnaire was used as the instrument for data collection to a sampled population of 301 undergraduate students. Data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics such as percentage, mean scores and standard deviation. The study revealed that undergraduate students of federal universities in North-central Nigeria are aware of the available information resources and the level of awareness is low. It was concluded that undergraduate students of agricultural science have high levels of awareness of the available information resources. It was recommended amongst others that the management of the studied university libraries should provide information resources and make them available in the libraries not only making them available but also find better ways of creating the awareness of such resources to the users including the agriculture students. This could be effectively achieved through the use of social media such as WhatsApp, Twitter, SMS and Facebook to mention but a few