The acquisition of skills in grasscutter farming will give rise to graduates who are self-reliant as unemployment will be reduced and there will be increase in the production of bush meat to meet the consumption demand in Kaduna state, hence this identified skills required by agricultural education graduates in grasscutter farming for self employment in Kaduna State. The study was guided by three objectives. Three research questions were answered by the study while three null hypotheses were formulated and tested at 0.05 level of significance. The study adopts survey research design. The study was carried out in Kaduna state using a target population of 241 made up of 48 animal science lecturers and 193 agricultural extension agents across the agricultural development zones in Kaduna State. There was no sampling because the whole population was involved in the study. The instrument of data collection was a 30-items structured questionnaire title “Glasscutter Farming Skills Questionnaire (GFSQ)†developed by the researchers from literature reviewed. The GFSQ was subjected to face and content validity by three validates. The instrument was trial tested on 15 respondents in Plateau State and the result was subjected to reliability analysis using Cronbach Alpha method which yielded a reliability coefficient of 0.91. The GFSQ was used for data collection by the researcher with the help of three research assistants. Data collected for the study was analyzed using mean ratings and standard deviation to answer research questions and t-test statistics to test the null hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The findings of study revealed 10 skills in planning, 10 skills in housing construction and 10 skills in breeding of grasscutter are required respectively for success in grasscutter farming. Based on the findings of this study, it was recommended amongst others that the identified skills in this study should be incorporated into the programme of the skills acquisition centres in the state so that it could be used for retraining the unemployed agricultural education graduates for self employment.
Keywords: Skills, Agricultural Education Graduates, Grasscutter Farming and Self-Employment