@article{2976,
author = "M. Jayani Chandima Fernando and R.M. Prabodha Subhashini Rathnayake and P. Wasana Jeewanthi",
abstract = "In Sri Lankan context in 2018, the Agriculture sector, which engages about 26.68 percent of the workforce, contributed about 7.8 percent to the national GDP and further the contribution has been steadily declining. Mainly, family-owned small sized farms contain agriculture sector as the number of commercial farms is low. Therefore, the need of agricultural extension worker’s instruction, guideline for rural farmers is vital. Therefore, this study is an attempt to investigate what are the core competencies influencing the Agricultural Extension workers' job performance in terms of quantity of work at the Department of Agriculture in Central Province. The target population of this study consists of all extension workers (N = 92) in Department of Agriculture (DOA) in Central Province. A semi structured questionnaire was used to survey extension workers’ job performance (Quantity of work). Principle Components Analysis Model (PCA) was used to generate new variable by reducing functions of X and Y. Multiple linear regression method was used to analyze the research data. Results showed that cultural competency, Program planning competency, Program evaluation competency, number of crop types in the division and number of farmers in the division, Cultural competency and number of farmers in the division positively influence the extension worker’s job performance while program planning competency, program evaluation competency, number of crop types in the division negatively influence the extension worker’s job performance. The findings suggest that cultural competency highly influences extension workers ҆ job performance, hence the focus should be given to Improve the extension worker’s awareness on local culture. It is strongly recommended for department of agriculture to increase the number of new recruitments of agriculture extension workers for employment and involvement of qualified extension workers from different ethnic groups in each districts of the country",
issn = "23191473",
journal = "IJAIR",
keywords = "Core Competency;Job Performance;Quantity of Work;Extension Workers;Principle Components Analysis Model",
month = "January",
number = "4",
pages = "458-463",
title = "{C}ore {C}ompetencies {I}nfluencing {A}griculture {E}xtension {W}orkers' {J}ob {P}erformance ({Q}uantity of {W}ork)",
volume = "7",
year = "2019",
}