Globally, environmental awareness campaigns occupy the foreground of deliberations at different fora including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, United Nations Environmental Programme, International Union for Conservation of Nature, Greenpeace etc. Concerns addressed are human activities that negatively impact climate with attendant unproductive consequences on geographic ecosystems. It has been observed that efforts are fixated on the activities of international oil companies, other industries and industrial agriculture. There is an obvious lack of consideration at the national or local levels for the unscrupled disruption of the local environment for livelihood and the cumulative adverse effects on the environment that cannot be readily measured. The paper aims at engendering pertinent changes where necessary and improving on existing productive methods, for the good of society through the instrumentality of rural news reporting. Based on the Norms Activation Theory and deploying the participant observation and desk research methodologies, this paper calls attention to the overlooked activities of rural agriculturist that impinge on the capacity of rural ecosystems to be sustainable. The role of agricultural reporting is therefore spotlighted as the only veritable means of exposing the positive and negative means of rural livelihood options for deserving action by government and other development providers. The work finally spells out measures agricultural reporting could be optimally deployed to achieve the stated aim.
Oyakemeagbegha Musah (Wed,) studied this question.