Covid-19 was found in Wuhan, China in October 2019 where the disease was expected from wildlife and started to spread in other regions including Malaysia. The first case Covid-19 in Malaysia was found in February 2020 when it was detected by tourists who came back from China. On 18th March 2020, Malaysia’s government announced the Movement Control Order (MCO), in which all of the sectors were interrupted including the agriculture sector. Thus, extension agents need to come out with a solution to help farmers and entrepreneurs during this hard time, to transfer the information, and increase their confidence and knowledge in agriculture during this pandemic. Therefore, this research is aiming to determine the relationship between Program Development Skills; Planning, Implementing, Monitoring and Evaluation towards their readiness to face the pandemic of Covid-19. From the results, monitoring and evaluating skills significantly contributed towards the readiness of extension agents. These two skills explained about 68.7% of the variance in the readiness of the extension agent to face challenges. Therefore, from this study most of the extension agents were ready to prepare or altered their program development skills based on the pandemic outbreak situation. The research would be important as an indicator of the readiness of extension agents and whether they are well prepared for the adjustment during the post-pandemic.
Athilia, A. (2015). Perception on Competency of Extension Agents among Farmers in North Seberang Perai, Penang (Unpublished Final Year Project thesis). Universiti Putra Malaysia.
Barrett, K. C., & Morgan Jr, G. A. (2005). SPSS for intermediate statistics: Use and interpretation: Psychology Press
Guilford, J. P. (1973). Fundamental Statistic in Psychology and Education (5th ed.). New York: McGrew-Hill
Latifah, M. H. (2017). The Involvement of Extension Agents in Planning, Implementing and Monitoring Activities Based on The Rice Check at IADA Pekan, Pahang (Unpublished Final Year Project thesis). Universiti Putra Malaysia.
Listiana, I., Efendi, I., Mutolib, A., & Rahmat, A. (2019). The behavior of Extension Agents in Utilizing Information and Technology to Improve the Performance of Extension Agents in Lampung Province. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 1155(1).
Motolani, M. M., Hassan, S., Olagunju, O., & Ramle, K. (2017). ToT and HRD competencies and its relationship to extension agents’ performance among cocoa smallholders. Journal of Agriculture and Veterinary Science (IOSR-JAVS),; 10, 14-21.
Purnomo, S. H., Sari, A. I., Emawati, S., Rahayu, E. T., & Triaswati, R. P. (2020). Agriculture Extension Officer’s Attitude and Readiness in Using Information and Communication Technology in Indonesia. Russian Journal of Agricultural and Socio-Economic Sciences, 100(4), 3–9.
Tiraieyari, N., Idris, K., Jegak, J., & Hamzah, A. (2010). Competencies Influencing Extension Workers.
Sail, R. M. (2010). Human resources development and transfer of technologies and their relationship to extension agents’ job performance. Akademika 79, 79(10),127–137
Shah, J. A., Asmuni, A., & Ismail, A. (2013). Roles of Extension Agents towards Agricultural Practice in Malaysia. International Journal on Advanced Science, Engineering and Information Technology, 3(1), 59–63.
Spencer, L., & Spencer, S. (1993). Competence at Work: Model for Superior Performance. New York: John Wiley & Sons.
Woodrow, L. (2014). Writing about quantitative research in applied linguistics. London, UK: Springer.
Yusuf, M., Hassan, S., Olagunju, O., and Hanif, M. N. L. (2017). “The Involvement Level of Extension Agent in Activities Based on Rice Check Technology at IADA PEKAN Pahang, Malaysia.” IOSR Journal of Agriculture and Veterinary Science, 10(07):81–85.