ABSTRACT

A study on the Adoption of the yam minisett technology by women farmers in Abia State, Nigeria, was carried out in the year 2003. The purpose of this study was to determine the extent of women farmers’ adoption of yam minisett technology. This was with a view to determine how to accelerate the widespread adoption of the technology in Abia State. A survey method was used for collecting primary data from the field. The respondents comprised 243 yam-growing women farmers, randomly selected from three agricultural zones in Abia State were interviewed using interview schedule. The statistical analysis involved determination of frequencies; percentages, group means and multiple regression analysis were used to analyze the data collected. The results showed that women fanners in Abia State were highly involved in seed and ware yam production, but lacked access to resources like fertilizer, loan, credit and agricultural information. However, the level of awareness of the yam minisett technology among the women farmers in the state was found to be 58% while the adoption rate was 33%. The extent of adoption, based on the percentage ofthe people that have adopted from six to seven components ofthe technology, was 67%. On the other hand, 93.10% ofthe adopters actively participated in all the activities involved in the adoption ofthe yam minisett technology. Profitability in the form of increased yield (93.67%) and income (94.94%) were the major reasons for adoption while lack of awareness of the technology and unavailability or scarcity of the complementary inputs (e.g. fertilizer and minisett dust were the major limiting factors to its adoption. The major sources of information about the technology were fellow farmers and production (96.71%). In order to improve the adoption rate of the yam minisett technology the following suggestions were made such as: carrying out more awareness campaigns on the technology among women farmers, providing complementary inputs (fertilizer and minisett dust) to women farmers, encouraging women farmers to form and also join cooperatives/farmers association, ensuring steady market and good prices for seed yam produced, increasing the number of extension agents as well as providing incentives and logistic support to them.