Awareness and Utilization of Artificial Intelligence Tools among Agricultural Education Lecturers within Universities in Enugu State

The study focused on awareness and utilization of AI tools among Agricultural education lecturers within universities in Enugu State. Specifically, it determined: level of awareness; extent of utilization of AI tools among the lecturers, challenges to adoption of the tools by the lecturers; strategies for improving AI utilizationn. The study adopted a survey research design. Area of study was Enugu State. Population comprises all 56 lecturers teaching agricultural education in public universities in the state. Questionnaire was used for data collection. Data were analyzed using mean, standard deviation and t-test at 0.05 level of significance. Findings reveal that lecturers had high awareness, including, in predictive analytics (X̅ = 3.24) and Climate forecasting tools (X̅g= 3.10) but low utilization of AI tools in teaching and research such as AI chatbots for queries (X̅g = 2.10) and AI in research supervision (X̅g= 2.39). Nine challenges to utilization were also identified, including lack of training (X̅g= 3.36) and poor internet connectivity (X̅g= 3.28). Furthermore, 11 strategies for improving AI adoption were identified, including regular AI training/workshops (X̅g= 3.34) and upgrading digital infrastructure (X̅g = 3.48). The t-test results further revealed no significant difference between the mean responses of male and female lecturers regarding their awareness (t = 0.15–0.86, p > 0.05), utilization (t = 0.29–0.71, p > 0.05), perceived challenges (t = 0.18–0.57, p > 0.05), and strategies for enhancing AI adoption (t = 0.17–0.44, p > 0.05).