Implementation of the Government Communication Strategy at Ministry Level

Abstract

This study focused on the implementation of the Agricultural Sector Knowledge Management and Communications Strategy (2016-2021) by the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries. The major aim of the study was to understand the factors that hinder government ministries from operationalizing the national communication strategy as mandated by law to effectively perform their communication function with respect to meeting the agriculture information needs of the nation. Data for this study was collected using in-depth interviews and document analysis. The interviews were administered to the ministry staff and Communication Specialists within the ministry. The data was qualitative in nature. The analysis of the data was done within the triangulation design in which data from the interviews was crosschecked with that documents analyzed in order to get richer explanations and to get rid of gaps. The study has its tenets in 2 theories i.e. the Systems Theory and Knowledge Management theory. This study’s key findings were that the MAAIF was able to develop the Agricultural Sector Knowledge Management and Communications Strategy (2016-2021) in the Financial Year 2015/16 and its implementation commenced in January 2018, which is a clear indication to the ministry’s commitment to communication. The strategy met the established standards of a good communication strategy. There was consensus among stakeholders that the strategy had not been implemented effectively so far, and from the findings, it was not backed by adequate facilitation and programming to address the information needs of the various stakeholders of the agriculture sector. Since funds are a key constraint to its implementation, the Government of Uganda (GoU) can consider the use of a phased approach to the strategy’s implementation, putting in place both internal and external communications personnel and incrementally resourcing them to implement its provisions. This can be supported by further building the ministry staff’s communication capacity and strengthening the coordination of information flow in the ministry.