AKSU Journal of Agricultural Economics, Extension and Rural Development

Economics and Intensity of Adoption of Improved Groundnut Technologies in Enugu State, Nigeria

Author:  Kaine, A. I. N and Ume, S. I.

Abstract
Agricultural technology assistances in enhancing productivity, alleviating poverty and economic development and this could be made possible through adoption of improved technologies. Numerous groundnut technologies and innovations have been developed through research and disseminated to farmers for decades for onward adoption. However, there is dearth of studies, especially in the context of Enugu State that have been carried out to analyze the factors affecting their intensive adoption and the economics. This study analyzed the economics and intensity of adoption of the improved groundnut technologies by farmers in the study area. One hundred and twenty (120) farmers were selected from twelve villages using multi stage sampling techniques. Well-structured questionnaire and oral interview were used to collect primary data. Percentage responses, liker type rating scale, Tobit model, net farm income and factor analysis were used to analyze the objectives of the study. The results showed that most (75%) of the farmers were females, married (79.16%), members of cooperatives (58.3%), educated with a mean household size of about 7 persons. The mean years of farming experienced and mean farm size were about 8.2 years, and 1.32 ha respectively. They had low access to extension services (33.36%) and poor access to credit (26.7%). The adopters of improved groundnut production technologies had higher profit compared with the non-adopters with net profits of N665,967 and N437,096 respectively. In addition, the factors that influenced positively the intensity of adoption of improved groundnut technologies were farm size, household size and farming experience. Additionally, the constraints to intensity of adoption of improve groundnut technologies in the study area were high cost of fertilizer (0.409), unavailability of market (0.432), poor access to extension services (0.456), poor road network (0.411), unavailability and high cost of labour (0.407) and poor access to credit (0.422). The need to enhance farmers’ access to credit facility, labour saving devices, improved productive inputs and extension services were proffered.