The Role Of Adopting Of Improved Agricultural Technologies In Enhancing Income Of Rural Households In Konta Zone, Southwest Ethiopia

Abstract

Adoption improved agricultural technologies have long been promoted by governments and development organizations as effective ways to increase farm productivity and reduce poverty. Encouraging rural households’ to use improved agricultural technologies to increase the efficiency of production and productivity is among the important policy measures to address the problem undertaken by the government. However, the adoption of many seemingly beneficial technologies remains low. The general objective of the study was to assess factors influencing the adoption of improved agricultural inputs and their impact on the income of small household farmers in the Konta zone. Both descriptive statistics, inferential statistics and econometric models were used to analyse the data. The logistic regression model was used to analyse the impact of technologies and the factors influencing the adoption of agricultural technologies respectively. The results presented that farmland size, number of oxen, number of livestock, and distance of household from farm training centre had a significantly influence the adoption level of improved agricultural technology. On the contrary, the high price of improved technology, access to credit, and membership in the cooperative associations of household heads had negatively affects the adoption level of improved farm inputs. Regarding the impact of adopting improved agricultural technology smallholder farmers who had adopted improved agricultural technology enhanced their annual crop income by about 15927.12 Birr per year for NNM, which is significant at 5% probability level, about 14177.854 birr per year for SM which is significant at 1% probability level, about 15304.172 birr per year for KM which is significant at 1% probability level and about 15159.602 birr per year for RM which is significant at 1% probability level. Based on the findings, the study suggests that strengthening the promotion of full-scale technology adoption will have a vital role in improving the livelihood of households in the study area. In doing so, managing the possible determining factors that affect the adoption of improved agricultural technology should be a precondition