Farmers’ thumbs are up for NSW Department of Primary Industries’ course on managing climate risk, with recent participants ranking the experience highly.

"There has been a notable improvement during the past 12 months in participants’ overall ranking of the course, compared to our previous assessment," NSW Department of Primary Industries’ Michael Cashen said.

According to Mr Cashen, DPI’s Climatology in Agric-ulture project officer, the PRO-farm course - A farmer’s guide to managing climate risk - meets its stated aims, participants’ expectations on content and the way it was delivered.

An analysis of 17 courses run during 2007-08, attended by 214 people, drew a minimum 97 per cent response rate to the five evaluation questions, with between 55 and 68pc giving the highest possible score to each.

"They ranked the standard of instruction highly, along with the topics covered and quality of training resources and reference materials, and said the topics covered were useful and presented at an appropriate level," Mr Cashen said.

The strongest points of the course were the understanding participants gained about how the Australian weather system works, drivers of Australian rainfall variability and climate change and its potential impact on the agricultural sector.

"To improve the course, their suggestions will be explored further and we’ll act on them as information comes to hand.

"They wanted more emphasis on resources and strategies to help them make decisions and find adaptation solutions to the impacts of climate change, both for their enterprises and for natural resource management.

"Feedback suggests some respondents were personally challenged by the risk management part of the course.

"A few participants said they would like more information on weather interpretation, weather modelling and more case studies with local data.

"They also thought courses and delivery dates could be promoted more actively."

 Mr Cashen says mapping on the course locations indicates a need to investigate why there is a low or no delivery of courses in particular regions.

"There may be particular cues or inhibitors, for example the distraction of previous good seasonal rainfall, reducing interest and enquiry for the course in the North Coast, Central and Far West," he said.

When Agriculture Today reported last December, the project leaders had polled 1500 participants from regional communities and farms, back as far as 2006.

At that stage, 80pc said they had already observed various affects of climate change and 90pc predicted further changes.

"Generally, feedback supports our previous assessment that rural people are looking for reliable unbiased information about climate variability and climate change and what it might mean for them," he said.

Contact Michael Cashen, Tocal, (02) 4939 8953, michael.cashen@dpi.nsw.gov.au or Gary Allan, Orange, (02) 6391 3902, gary.allan@dpi.nsw.gov.au