Preference-Based Design and Prototype Development of Farm Clothing for Youth Farmers in Cross River State, Nigeria

The study developed protective clothing for youths in farming communities in Cross River State as a means of preventing farming hazards youth farmers are exposed to in the farm. 3 specific purposes and 3 research question guided the study. The area of the study was Cross River State. The study adopted reseach and development (R&D) design. The population for the study was 1,471,099 youth farmers. The smple size for the study was 400 youth farmers. A Multi-stage sampling techniques was used to randomly sellect 400 youth farmers from the population of 1,471,099 youth farmers. The insrument used for data collection was a sructured questionnaire which was admisterd to 400 respondents. The instruments were validated by five experts from the Faculty of Vocational and Technical Education University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Crombach Alpha reliability method was used to test the reliability of the instrument and the result yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.91, and 0.88, 0.80 respectively. The data collected was analyzed using mean and stadard deviation. From the data collected and analyzed, the following major findings were revealed among others that; twenty (20) farming activities are carried out by youth farmers in the farm, 17 items were required for the construction of protective clothing needed by youth farmers in Cross River State farming communities. 3 sets of prototype protective clothing items were produced. In conclusion, the study demonstrated that is possible to reduce, prevent injury among the youth farmers with protective clothing. The following recommendation were made from the study.