Evaluation of mLearning Usability by Farmers: Case Study of Haller Farmers Application

Agricultural extension, a process responsible for teaching farmers about better agricultural practices, is faced with the challenge of few extension agents compared to the number of farmers. While mobile phones have been used to address this challenge through mobile learning (mLearning), usability has received little attention. This study sought to establish how usability of mLearning applications aimed at supporting agricultural extension can be improved. Snowball sampling was used to sample 32 farmers who downloaded and used Haller Farmers app for a period of three weeks, after which, they rated its usability based on 10 criteria. Case study research design was used and both qualitative and quantitative data were gathered and analysed in order to provide a better understanding of how participants rated the application’s usability. Suggestions on what can be done to improve the usability criteria which had mean scores of less than +1 (on a -2 to +2 scale) were recommended. These suggestions can be beneficial not only to developers of Haller Farmers application, but also to other mobile application developers and institutions responsible for agricultural extension.