Understanding the Socioeconomic, Cultural and Institutional dynamics of technology adoption is essential for the design, and promotion of Agricultural Technologies and achieve widespread adoption.

1. Socio-economic and institutional
imperatives of Conservation Agriculture
adoption by smallholder farmers in Africa
Regional Training of Trainers Course for Extension Personnel in Southern
Africa
Harare, Zimbabwe
July 2010]
Mutyasira Vine
vinemutyasira@yahoo.com

2. The utility of socio-economic evaluations
 To make good recommendations for farmers, researchers
must be able to evaluate alternative technologies from the
farmers' point of view;
Demonstrate the actual impacts of the technology on rural
livelihoods
Identify best and more appropriate options under specific
conditions
Facilitate in decision making (resource allocation)
To provide feedback for further research
Synthesize a body of knowledge that facilitates adaptation
and adoption of CA in smallholder farming systems

3. Evaluation of CA Technologies
Farmers consider a number of factors before adopting new
technologies
Due to scarcity, farmers consider technologies that yield
the greatest returns to time and money invested in farming
Economic viability is, however, one of the many pillars and
is a necessary but not a sufficient indicator in technology
adoption.
Farmers consider other factors such as the risks associated
with alternative technologies.
Hence the need to include farmers’ perspectives on the costs
and benefits associated with each technology
Also need to consider the broad socio-economic aspects of
each technology/practice

4. Financial analysis: Partial budgets
Looks at income and expense items affected by the
proposed change
Will the proposed change be more/less profitable that
the status quo?
Based on the principle that the new techno will affect
one or more of the following areas
Increase in income
Reduction or elimination of costs
Increase in costs
Reduction or elimination of income CA

5. Estimating costs
Farmers compare the gross benefits of each treatment, but they
will want to take account of the different costs as well.
What are the additional input cost or labor cost or animal
traction costs?
Need only be concerned by those costs that differ across the
treatments or the costs that vary.
Example
 Labor use for weeding
 Fertilizers if we use different rates
 Herbicides, herbicide application costs
 Land preparation costs-animal traction
 Harvesting costs which varies with quantities harvested
The total costs that vary for each treatment is the sum of the
individual costs that vary

6. What drives CA adoption by SH farmers?
Increased productivity
More and stable yields
Economic benefits
Reduction in production (labor/input) costs
Increased revenues (higher yields)
However, experience has shown that farmers’
adoption decision is not entirely influenced by the
observed productivity or monetary benefits of CA

7. Fundamentals of adoption (CA)
• Adoption refers to an individual’s decision to use a new
practice on a regular basis.
• Adoption follows sequential and /or over lapping stages of:
– Awareness
– Evaluation
– Trial
– Final Adoption
• Farmers may not achieve full adoption of a package
of CA in the short run because it often takes time
for farmers to experiment with one or more
components of the package
•

8. Levels (category) of adoption
Category of adopters
Full adopters
Whole package (?)
Significant area (?)
Consistently over
time (?)
Partial adopters /
experimenters
Components
Not a significant area
Inconsistent /
intermittent
Dis-Adopters
Tested whole or part
of package as
experimenters
Discontinued

9. Incidence vs intensity of adoption
An evaluation of technology adoption by farmers
requires the assessment of the following:
What kind of technology (which components)?
How fast is the technology adopted (rate of adoption)?
How is the new technology impacting on the farming
system (impact assessment)?
How widely is the technology used on the farm (intensity)?
The incidence of adoption indicates whether a farmer has
used a technology (yes/no)
The intensity explains the degree of use of a technology (e.g.
area)

10. Key determinants of adoption
1.Technology attributes
2. Farmer characteristics
Compatibility issues
Age, education, wealth
3.Institutional factors
Tenure, credit, markets

11. Peculiarities of CA
Knowledge intensive
The intellectual cost of adopting CA may be
considerably high because it requires a better
understanding of farm systems, cropping systems, or
chemicals.
Adopting CA imposes a need for increased learning
Does not yield immediate benefits
Unlike high-yielding varieties, CA benefits are seldom
visible in the short run
Decisions to adopt are therefore investment decisions,
based on expected future benefit stream

12. CA attributes cont…
Management intensive:
CA adoption implies a paradigm shift that requires
changes to the mgt of the entire system
It is generally mgt intensive and require great
commitment to constant learning
It is a package of interrelated components
Specific components of the CA system tend to be
environment-specific
Farmers usually evaluate specific components (partial vs
full adoption)

13. Implications for adoption
CA adoption is a gradual process, not an
instantaneous event
Most farmers adopt CA partially and incrementally
Establish long term monitoring of adopters to better
understand the adoption process and diffusion
pathways

14. Incremental adoption

15. CA adoption and impact pathways
Labor saving and spreading
 Reallocates land prep to the dry
season
 Redistributes heavy labor
requirements out of the peak
planting period
 Enhances timely planting
 Saved labor facilitates
diversification into cash crops
e.g. tomato, paprika
 Diversification fills the hunger
gap (enhanced nutrition)
 More time for value addition/
post harvest processing (job
creation)

16. Unpacking dynamics of labor use in CA
Is CA labor intensive?
Higher yields under CA come with increased input use
(risk considerations)
Initial adoption of CA requires increased use of labor for
mulching, manure application and weeding
1st year CA farmers spend double the labor requirements
to produce a hectare of maize compared to CP (ICRISAT,
2007)
Year -round requirement for labor may also give rise to the
perception that CA is labor intensive
Labor demand gradually decreases with time e.g. labor for
weed control declines with successive weeding

17. Labor subsides over time: Haggblade (2009)

18. Labor dynamics cont…
Returns to labor = 3.73, 4.34 & 1.92 respectively

19. Maize production per 1 ha (ICRISAT,2007)
Variable
1st year CA 2+ yrs CA
CP
Maize yield (kg/ha)
1520
1780
368
Gross revenue (@$0.40/kg)
608
712
147
Total labor units (dys)
144.56
148.27
68.61
Total labor costs (@0.88)
127.22
130.47
60.38
TVC
196.30
199.55
91.78
Gross margin ($/ha)
411.71
512.45
71.23
Costs per kg
0.13
0.11
0.25
Returns to labor ($/dy)
3.73
4.34
1.92

20. Seasonality issues (labor)
Seasonality of food availability
Engaging labor effort in off-farm work during the off-
season to meet immediate consumption requirements
implies raises the opportunity cost of labor
Case of SRI in Madagascar (Moser and Barret, 2002)
Low-external input rice production method
High yield potential with no chemical/mechanical inputs
Introduced during the off-season
Seasonal liquidity and family labor constraints hinder
adoption
Casual labor for day wages in the rice fields of other
farmers provides coping strategy during the hungry
season

21. Transitory/seasonal Food Insecurity
Usually
Usually
seek for
seek for
off-farm
off-farm
work
work
CFU (2010)

22. Socio-economic aspects of CA adoption
Socio-economic factors determine the ultimate decision to
adopt
The appropriateness of a technology for smallholder
farmers is not necessarily and entirely defined by its costsaving abilities
Economic viability is a necessary but NOT sufficient
condition for uptake by farmers
Studies show that there has not been widespread adoption
of CA practices, < 1% among SH farmers
(Waddington,2003)
Major reason cited being the failure to appreciate the
constraints faced by smallholder farmers for whom they
are intended

23. Issues in adoption & upscaling
Rotation/intercrop
Food security concerns
Availability of markets for
other crops
Availability of
seed/chemical inputs for
other crops
Social aspects of crop
production (Senegal case)
Siziba (2008)

24. Facilitating CA adoption
An understanding of the processes leading to the adoption
of new technologies by SHs facilitates the planning and
implementation of successful research and extension
programs.
farm-household factors: age, education, and personal
characteristics of the household head; ownership of
livelihood assets
Village/ community level factors help to explain:
-Why was there widespread adoption in one village but not others in
the same general location?
-Why did one project lead to apparently successful adoption, but
another, following the same procedures and promoting the same
technologies, result in failure?

25. How do we get to know the farmer circumstances?
Baseline surveys important to unpack issues of:
Key agricultural/livelihood activities
Existing farming technologies (draught power)
Main production enterprises (crop/livestock)
Main sources of income
Resource endowments (wealth)
Access to markets (factor/product)
Gender dimensions
Rapid Rural Appraisal (RRA)
Activity undertaken by a multidisciplinary team to obtain
new information about rural life
Includes key informant interviews, focus-group
interviews etc

26. Common features of SH farmers
(obtainable from baselines)
 Product markets, credit markets, information markets, land
markets and labor market are weak or even non-existent;
 Little access to financial capital
 Subsistence remain the dominant farming strategy
 They are risk averse
 Manage mixed crop/livestock systems
 Rely to a large degree on family members for hand labor.
 Have close community linkages with weaker links outside the
community.
 Have less formal education than large-scale commercial farmers
 Often are situated in marginal areas with respect to rainfall and
topography
 Often have precarious land tenure

27. Implications for techno devt & dissemination
The technology must fit into the existing farming system
and the broad livelihood systems, matching the strategy
developed by the family
Participatory Technology Development (PTD): the active
engagement and involvement of beneficiaries in decision
making at every stage of technology development is vital
More participatory, community-based methodologies are
needed in technology development and dissemination

28. Emerging approaches
Farmer-managed demonstration plots
Review of farmers’ experiences with CA –which
components adopted or disadopted & why
Farmers’ perceptions and expectations through focus
group discussions
Farmer exchange visits
Community awareness meeting
Field tours
Innovation histories

29. Innovation platforms: CIMMYT

30. Innovation History
Promotes institutional learning and reflection on the
adoption process
Allows people concerned to reflect on their actions and
how better results might be achieved in the future
Enables us to understand the dynamics of adoption
process and to learn about farmers’ perceptions of the
constraints they face along the way
Also portrays the gradual nature of CA adoption

31. Thank you