Agroecological dimension of sustainable intensification technologies adoption in northern Ghana

Abstract

AbstractAdopting sustainable intensification technologies improves the productivity, incomes, and livelihoods of small farm households; however, their adoption remains disproportionately low. Although soil, climate and vegetative cover are important factors in determining the viability of sustainable intensification technologies in agronomic trials or field experiments, they are rarely considered in socio-economic analyses of smallholder adoption decisions. Using agroecological zones as proxies for similar soil, climate, and vegetation conditions in two agroecological zones in northern Ghana, we examined their effects on smallholder farmers’ decisions to adopt sustainable intensification technologies. We applied a multistage sampling technique to obtain data from 461 small farm households in the Sudan savannah and Guinea savannah agroecological zones. We observed a statistically significant difference in the covariates of adopters and non-adopters of sustainable intensification technologies in terms of age (6.389, p < 0.010), education (0.106, p < 0.010), group membership (0.648, p < 0.010), access to extension services (1.274, p < 0.010) and access to credit (GH¢52.436, p < 0.010). The odds of sustainable intensification technologies adoption depend on age, number of agricultural extension visits, group or farmer-based organisation membership, education and agroecological factors (2.140, p < 0.050). The study provides an opportunity for future research to consider the inclusion of farm-level measurement of agroecological variables in explaining the adoption behaviour of small farm households.

Keywords

• Adoption
• agroecological zones
• northern Ghana
• smallholder farmers
• sustainable intensification technologies (SITs)
• Manuel Tejada, Universidad de Sevilla, Spain