Assessment of Farmers Perception on Adoption of Improved Rice (Nerica) Technology in Kwami Local Government Area of Gombe State, Nigeria
Musa, H.Y; Umar, M.R. and Zakari, H.
Department of Agricultural Ext. &Mgt.
Taraba State College of Agriculture Jalingo.
ABSTRACT The study was conducted in Kwami Local Government Area of Gombe State, Nigeriato investigate Adoption of Rice Technology. The specific objectives were to describe the socio-economic variables of the respondents, determine the adoption levels of rice farmers and find out any relationship between the farmers socio-economic characteristics and their adoption constraints. Data were collected from 120 respondents drawn from the study area using multi-stage sampling techniques. The data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics such as frequencies, percentages and regression analysis. The major findings on socio-economic characteristics revealed that 34.7% of the respondents were between 31-40 years of age, 60.2 percent were males, 66.3% had attended at least primary to tertiary education, in which most of them operates farm size of 6-10 hectares. Production and on-farm constraints affecting rice development were water management and flood. Major economic constraints faced by rice farmers were lack of viable financial agencies to support production, poor capital base and non-availability of loan. Regression analysis showed that the yield of rice was negatively related to land acquisition constraints (=-0.34, p<0.05) and Technological constraints (= -0.43, p < 0.01). This study concluded that problems faced by farmers were interwoven in which existence of one relates with the other. Addressing these problems will lead to increase in the rate of adoption of improved rice production technology and ultimately rice productivity in Nigeria
