adoption of improved rice cultivation practices by ...

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF BUSINESS, SOCIAL AND SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH ISSN: 2309-7892, Volume: 2, Issue: 1, Page: 13-19, July-September, 2014

Invited Paper

ADOPTION OF IMPROVED RICE CULTIVATION PRACTICES BY FARM ERS IN RELATION TO THEIR CHARACTERISTICS M.S.M.M. Sumon1 , S.C. Shovon2, A. Mahjuba2, H. Mehraj3 and AFM Jamal Uddin3 * M.S.M.M. Su mon, S.C. Shovon, A. Mahjuba, H. Mehraj and AFM Jamal Uddin (2014). Adoption of I mproved Rice Cultivation P ractices by Farmers in Relation to their Characteristics. Int. J. Bus. Soc. Sci. Res. 2( 1): 13-19. Retrieve from http://www.ijbssr.com/currentissueview/140103040 Received Date: 30/06/2014

Acceptance Date: 09/07/2014

Published Date: 09/07/2014

Abstract The study was conducted to determine the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices by far mers and to explore its relationships with characteristics of far mers at three villages of Mohadipur Union, P alashbari Upazila, Gaibandha, Bangladesh. Randomly 116 (8% of 1453) far mers were selected from three villages as sample for the study. Maximum 62.93% of respondents had medium while 20.69% had low and 16.38% had high adoption of improved rice cultivation practices. Education, training exposure, organizational participation, extension media contact and cosmopoliteness had significant positive relationship with the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices. Family size, farm size and annual income had no significant positive relationship with the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices.

Key words: Adoption, improved rice cultivation practice, relationship, farm er’s characteristics. Introduction Rice is the staple food of Bangladesh and about 90% of the population depends on rice as their m ajor food (IRRI, 1981). Agricultural land is decreasing day by day in Bangladesh thus future production must be achi eved with less land. Success of any technology depends on its dissemination among potential users. Adoption of new technologies by farmers varied due to the factors rel ated to farm ers like poverty, lack of knowledge (Robert et al., 1989). Organized delivery of inputs and outputs, provision of technical advice, effective training, stable prices and credit for participating farmers are important for farmer’s adoption of innovation (Adams, 1982) also involves awareness, interest, evaluations, trial and adoption (Rogers, 1962; Van Den B an and Hawkin, 1996). Extent to which farmers adopt innovation and it’s impact in terms of yield, income and increase in living standard (Diederen et al., 2003). Considering these points, current study was undertaken to determine the extent of adoption of improved rice cultivation practices by farm ers and its relationship to the farmer’s charact eristics. Methodology Durgapur, Garanata and Bishramgaci villages of Mohadipur Union of Palashbari Upazila under Gaibandha District in Bangladesh were selected as locale of this study. Randomly 116 (8% of 1453) farmers were selected from three villages as sample for this study (Table l). A reserve list of 10 respondents was also prepared for covering the positions in case of the absence of the select ed respondents during interview (Table l). Table 1. Distribution of the population, sample and number of farmers in reserve list Name of villages Durgapur Garanata Bishramgaci Total

Population size 476 508 469 1453

Sample size 38 41 37 116

Reserve list size 3 4 3 10

Selection of Dependent and Independent Variables: Age, education, family size, farm size, annual income, training exposure, organization participation, extension media contact and cosmopoliteness of respondents were sel ected as independent variabl es and adoption of improved rice cultivation practices was dependent vari able. *Corresponding Authors Email: [email protected] 1 Department of Agricultural Extension and Information Sy stem, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University , Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh 2 Department of Agricultural Botany , Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University , Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh 3 Department of Horticulture, Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University , Dhaka-1207, Bangladesh

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Age: One score was assigned for each year of his/her age. Education: One score was assigned for each completed year of schooling. If a respondent did not know reading and writing, his/her education score was assigned as zero (0). Respondent was scored 0.5 i f he/she only could sign his/her name. Family size: Assigned score one for each member of the family. Farm size: Farm size was measured by using following formula FS = A1 + A2 + ½ (A3 + A4 ) – A5 + A6 + A7 + A8 Where; FS = Farm size, A1 = Homestead land, A2 = Land under own cultivation, A3 = Land given to others on share cropping (borga), A4 = Land taken from others on share cropping (borga), A5 = Land given to others on lease, A6 = Land taken from others on lease, A7 = Pond and A8 = Garden Annual income: Annual income was measured on the basis of total yearly earnings. Total yield from all sources in preceding year were converted into cash income (taka) according to prevailing market price and added together to obtain total income of a respondent. Training exposure: Training exposure of a respondent was measured on the basis of number of days of training received on rice cultivation from different sources in the last five years. Score one was assigned for receiving one day training. Organizational participation: The following scale was used for computing organizational participation score: Categories of participation

Score 0 1 2 3

No participation Participation as ordinary member Participation as executive member Participation as executive officer

In case of membership in two or more organizations, scores were computed by adding scores obtained for each organization according to the categori es of his/her m embership. Finally, organizational participation score was measured by summation of the s cores obtained from all the select ed organizations. Extension media contact: all extension media contact were measured in following manners Extent of contact

Weighting system

Not at all

0

Rarely Occasionally Frequently Regularly

1 2 3 4

Cosmopoliteness: The scale used for computing cosmopoliteness score was presented below Extent of visit Not at all Rarely Occasionally Oftenly Regularly

Assigned Score 0 1 2 3 4

Measurement of dependent variable: Adoption of improved ri ce cultivation practices was the dependent variable of the study. The selected technologies were: Modern M echani cal Cultivation (MC), High Yielding Variety (HYV) practice, Line and/or spacing of seedling (LS), Urea Super Granular (USG), Controlled irrigation (CI), Integrated Pest Management (IPM), Leaf colour chart (LC), Organi c fertilizer and/green manure (OG). For this study years of use of adopt ed practices (No. 4) was chosen for measuring the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices.

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Measurem ent of Adoption was presented below Sl. No. 01. 02. 03. 04. 05. 06. 07. 08.

Measurem ent of Adoption Adoption and non-adoption Number of practices adopted Percent of Applicable practices adopted Years of use of adopted practices Innovativeness scale Guttman scale of adoption Trace line scale of adoption Adoption quotient

Years of use of adopted farm practices: For this study the length of the period of' use of the innovation was taken into consideration. The adoption score for this study was measured by using the following formula: AS = AP MC + APHYV + AP LS + AP USG + APCIM + AP IPM + AP LC + AP OG Where, AS = Adoption Score, AP MC = Adoption Period for Modern Mechanical Cultivation, APHYV = Adoption Period for High Yielding Variety, AP LS = Adoption Period for Straight-row and/or proper Spacing of seedlings, AP USG = Adoption Period for Urea Super Granular, AP CIM = Adoption Period for Controlled Irrigation Method, AP IPM = Adoption Period for Integrated Pest Management, AP LC = Adoption Period for Leaf Colour Chart and AP OG = Adoption Period for Organic fertilizer and/Green manure Hypothesis of the Study: There are no rel ationships between each of the s elect ed characteristics of the rice farmers and their adoption of improved rice cultivation practices. Data Collection and Statistical Analysis: Data were collect ed during the period from 01 to 30 June, 2013. All possible efforts were established rapport with respondents. Information was duly checked in order to minimize errors. The qualitative data were convert ed into quantitative by means of suitable scoring techniques for the purpose of analysis. For describing the independent and the dependent variables, the respondents were cl assi fied into several cat egories in respect of each of the variable. The computer software SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences, version 11.5) was used to analyze the data. In order to explore the rel ationships between adoption of improved ri ce cultivation practices and select ed characteristics of rice farmers, the Pearson Product Moment Correlation was us ed at 5% level o f significance as the basis of rejecting any null hypothesis. If the computed value of co-effici ent of correlation ‘r’ was equal to or greater than table value at designed 5% level of signi ficance for relevant degrees of freedom, null hypothesis was reject ed and it was concluded that there was signi ficant relationship between the concerned vari ables. However, when the computed value of co-effi cient o f correlation was found to be smaller than tabulated value at 5% level of signi ficant for relevant degrees of freedom, it was concluded that null hypothesis could not be rejected and hence there was no relationship between the concerned variables. Results And Discussion Characteristics of the Rice Farmers Age: Age of the respondents was ranged from 24 to 70 years with average 44.39 years having 11.91 SD (Standard Devi ation). Maximum 46.55% of the respondents fell in the young aged cat egory compared to 44.83% middle, 8.62% old aged cat egory and 91.38% of respondents comprised young to middle-aged categori es (Table 2). Young people generally show more favorable attitude towards new ideas and older farmers because might have valuable opinions in regard to adoption of improve rice cultivation practices becaus e of their longer farm experi ence. Education: The education score of the respondents ranged from 0 to 15 with average 3.86 having 3.69 SD. Maximum 31.03% of respondents had primary education, 23.28% illiterate and secondary education, 17.24% can sign only and 8.62% having above secondary education (Table 2). As education enlightens a person, it may contribute to the adoption of improve farm practices. The findings indicate that education of an individual is likely to be more receptive to the modern facts and ideas; they have much mental strength in deciding on a matter related to problem solving or adoption of technologies in their daily life. Thus, farming community in the study area may be well considered as a suitable ground for the adoption of technologies, or execution of change programme what ever needed. Family size: The family size of the respondents ranged from 2 to 9 with a mean of 3.97 and 1.90 SD. Small families constituted the maximum proportion (69.83%) of the farmers, while 22.43% had medium family and the remaining 7.76% had large family (Table 2). The findings of the study revealed that http://www.ijbssr.com

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overwhelming majority (92.78%) of the farmers have small to medium family size. The people of the study area were very much al ert to keep their family size small. Small size family can educate their children properly and can enjoy other social amenities. Farm si ze: Farm size was varied from 0.07 to 2.11 hectares with average 0.73 hectares having 0.43 SD. The respondents were cl assi fied into three cat egories based on their farm size as followed by DAE (DAE, 1995). Maximum proportion (78.45%) of the farm ers had small farm compared to 22.43% had medium farm and none of them had large farm. Annual income: Annual income of the respondents ranged from Tk. 68 to 373 thousand with a mean of Tk. 204.66 thousand and SD 75.07 thousand. Maximum proportion (56.90%) of the respondents had medium annual income compared to 31.90% fell in high income group and 11.20% in low income group (Table 2). Thus, the majority (88.20%) of the respondents had medium to high family income indicating that improved rice cultivation practices were usually practiced by the farmers having comparatively higher economic standard. The average income of the farmers of the study area is much higher. This might be due to the fact that the farmers of the study area were not only engaged in agriculture. They also earn from other sources such as s ervice, business etc. farmers with the low income generally hesitate to adopt innovations in their own farms because of their lower risk bearing ability and their inability to make necess ary financial investment.

Observed 24-70

Training exposure Organizational participation

0-30

0-24

Extension media contact

0- 40

3-25

Cosmopoliteness

0-28

6-21

0-12

68-373 0.07-2.11

2-9

Taka (‘000)

0-15

Unknown Possible Unknown

Actual (in ha)

Annual income

Days obtained

Unknown Unknown Unknown Unknown

No. of members

Farm size

Scores

Actual Years

Family size

Scores

Education

Range

Scores

Age

Year of schooling

Charact eristics

Measuring unit

Table 2. Salient features of the respondents with their characteristics Farmers Categories

Number (N=116)

Percent (%)

Young aged (˂ 35) Middle aged (35-50) Old (> 50) Illiterate (0) Can sign only (0.5) Primary education (1-5) Secondary education (610) Above secondary education (>10) Small (≤ 4) Medium (5-7) Large (> 7) Small (˂ 1 ha) Medium (1-2.99) Large (≥ 3.00) Low (≤ 120) Medium (121-240) High (> 240) Low (≤ 4) Medium (5-8) High (> 8) Low (≤ 8) Medium (9-16) High (> 16) Low (≤ 8) Medium (9-16) High (> 16) Low (≤ 9) Medium (10-18) High (> 18)

54

46.55

52 10 27 20

44.83 8.62 23.28 17.24

36

31.03

27

23.28

6

5.17

81 26 9 91 25 0 13 66 37 93 20 3 99 12 5 35 61 20 35 70 11

69.83 22.43 7.76 78.45 21.55 0.00 11.20 56.90 31.90 80.17 17.24 2.59 85.34 10.34 4.32 30.17 52.59 17.24 30.17 60.34 9.49


Mean

SD

37.81

10.14

3.86

3.69

3.97

1.90

0.73

0.43

204.66

75.07

2.25

2.54

4.53

4.92

11.41

4.86

12.56

4.38


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Training exposure: Training exposure score of the respondent farmers ranged from 0 to 12 with mean and SD of 2.25 and 2.54 respectively. Maximum 80.17% of the respondents were in low training group while, 17.24% of them had m edium training and only 2.59% had high training exposure. Training helps the farmers to acquire deep knowl edge and improve skills about the respected aspects. Trained farmers can cope with and handle smoothly the adverse situation in their cultivation. So, they show favourabl e attitude toward adoption of innovation. Organizational participation: The maximum organizational participation score of the respondents was 24 and the minimum score was zero ‘0’. However, the average was 4.53 and the SD was 4.92. Maximum proportion (85.34%) of the rice farmers had low organizational participation while 10.34% had medium organizational participation and the rest 4.32% had high organizational participation. The findings revealed that, an overwhelming portion (95.66%) of the farmers had in low to medium organizational participation in the study area. The extent of organizational participation in the study area was not satisfactory. The same result was found in respect of cosmopoliteness and ext ension contact. The DAE extension personnel should be more alert about their clients’ communication behaviour. They must have motivation strategy to make their client more cosmopolite, active to extension partner and active organizational participatory. Extension media contact: The computed extension media contact scores of the respondents ranged from 3 to 25 with an average 11.41 and SD of 4.86 against the possible range of 0 to 40. Maximum proportion (52.59%) of the farmers had medium media contact, while 30.17% had low media contact and 17.24% of the respondents had high media contact. The findings of the study indicate that majority of the respondents (82.76%) had low and medium extension contact with various information sources for getting necessary agricultural inform ation. Bashar (1993), Pal (1995) and Hussen (2001) observed almost similar findings regarding media contact for getting agricultural inform ation. Cosmopoliteness: Cosmopoliteness scores of the respondents ranged from 6 to 21 against the possible range of 0 to 28 with an average of 12.56 and the SD of 4.38. Majorities (60.34%) of the respondents were “ medium cosmopolite” compared to 30.17% of them were “low cosmopolite” and the remaining 9.49% were “ high cosmopolite”. Data also revealed that overwhelming majorities (90.51%) of the respondents had low to medium cosmopoliteness. Adoption of improved rice cultivation practice (IRCP) Adoption score of improved rice cultivation practices was ranged from 9 to 48. The average score was 25.45 with a SD of 8.89. Maximum 62.93% of respondents were medium adoption, 20.69% were low adoption and 16.38% were high adoption (Table 3). A majority (79.31%) of the farmers had medium to high adoption of IRCP. Farmers were trying to adopt improved rice cultivation practices though they had to face various socio-economic di fficulties and had limited resources. DAE and other extension organizations, especially the NGOs should provide more technological supports to the farm ers. In such cases, it is expected that the farmers will be able to adopt improved ri ce cultivation practices with better perform ance. Table 3. Distribution of the farmers according to their adoption of improved rice cultivation practices Respondents Number Percent 24 20.69 73 62.93 19 16.38 116 100

Categories (Scores ) Low adoption (≤ 17) Medium adoption (18-34) High adoption (≥ 35) Total

Mean

SD

25.45

8.89

Relationship between adoption of improved rice cultivation practices (IRCP) and selected characteristics of the rice farmers For descriptive interpretation of the meaning of ‘r’ Table 4. had been used. Table 4. The Meaning of ‘r’ values ‘r’ value 0.00 to 0.19 0.20 to 0.39 0.40 to 0.69 0.70 to 0.89 0.90 to 1.00 Source: Cohen and Holliday, 1982: 92-93


Meaning A very low correlation Low correl ation A moderate correlation A high correlation A very high correlation

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Results of correlation have been shown in Table 5. Correlation co-effi cient among all the variables might be seen in the correlation matrix in Table 6. Relationship between adoption of improved rice cultivation practices (IRCP) with Age: Observed value (r = -0.071) was found to be smaller than tabulated value (r = 0.184) at 5% level of probability (Table 5) so null hypothesis could not be rejected. Farmer’s age had no significant relationship with adoption of IRCP i.e., farm ers of all age categori es can adopt IRCP. Education: Observed value (r = 0.577) was found to be greater than tabulat ed value (r = 0.241) at 1% level of probability (Table 5) so null hypothesis was rejected. Education of farm ers had significant positive relationship with adoption of IRCP i.e., higher education might cause higher adoption. Education really a powerful variable that could influence farmers to adopt IRCP. Family size: Observed value (r = 0.123) was found to be smaller than tabulat ed value (r = 0.184) at 5% level of probability (Table 5) so null hypothesis could not be rejected. Family size of farm er’s had no significant rel ationship with adoption of IRCP. Farm si ze: Obs erved value (r = 0.179) was smaller than tabulated value (r = 0.184) at 5% level o f probability (Table 5) so null hypothesis could not be rejected. Farm size of farmers had no significant relationship with adoption of IRCP. Annual income: Observed value (r = 0.125) was smaller than tabulated value (r = 0.184) at 5% level of probability (Table 5). So, null hypothesis could not be rejected. Annual income of the farmers had no significant rel ationship with the adoption of IRCP. Training exposure: Observed value (r = 0.324) was greater than tabulated value (r = 0.241) at 1% level of probability (Table 5). So, null hypothesis was rejected. Training exposure had highly significant positive relationship with the adoption of IRCP. Training increases courage and enable farmers to do new or complicated farming activities. Use of any improved rice cultivation practices may be complicated to the farmer’s community so training exposure is a signi ficant attribute for adoption of IRCP. Organizational participation: Observed value (r = 0.586) was great er than tabulated value (r = 0.241) at 1%level of probability (Table 5). So, null hypothesis was rejected. Organizational participation of farmers had signi ficant relationship with adoption of IRCP. Organizational participation helps the farmers to acquire more knowledge and lead them to become more localize that direct the farmers to be more innovative and adoptive. Table 5. Pearson’s product moment co-efficient of correl ation showing relationship between adoption of improved rice cultivation practices and the selected characteristics of the farmers Dependent variable

Independent variables

Computed value of co-efficient of correlation ‘r’

Age Education Adoption of Family size Farm size improved rice Annual income cultivation Training exposure practices Organizational participation Extension media contact Cosmopoliteness **; Significant at the 0.01 level, *; Significant at the 0.05 level,

-0.071NS 0.577** 0.123NS 0.179 NS 0.125 NS 0.324** 0.586** 0.384** 0.236* NS ; Not significant

Tabulated value at 114 df 5% 1%

0.184

0.241

Extension media contact: Observed value (r = 0.384) was greater than tabulated value (r = 0.241) at 1% level of probability (Table 5). So, null hypothesis was rejected. Extension media contact of framers had significant positive relationship with adoption of IRCP. The extension media contact strengthened the base of farmers’ knowledge. The knowledge definitely acts as motivator towards adoption of new technologies. It means that higher the extension media cont acts of the farmer lead to higher the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices. Cosmopoliteness: Observed value (r = 0.236) was greater than tabulated value (r = 0.184) at 5% level of probability (Table 5). So, null hypothesis was rejected. Cosmopoliteness had significant relationship with adoption of IRCP by farmers. Cosmopolite farm ers becom e adoptive by visiting and learning new things of agriculture. http://www.ijbssr.com


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Table 6. correlation matrix Charact ers X1 X2 X3 X4 X5 X6 X7 X8 X9 Y X1 1 X2 -0.035 1 X3 -0.152 0.021 1 X4 0.029 0.085 0.124 1 X5 -0.103 0.023 -0.035 -0.013 1 X6 0.127 0.296** 0.042 0.003 0.262** 1 X7 -0.018 0.353** 0.051 0.032 -0.009 0.183* 1 X8 -0.091 0.257** 0.051 0.264** 0.074 0.201* 0.173 1 X9 0.025 0.253** 0.066 0.074 0.064 0.056 0.269** 0.293** 1 Y -0.017 0.577** 0.123 0.179 0.125 0.324** 0.586** 0.384** 0.236* 1 X1 : Age, X2 : Education, X3 : Family size, X4: Farm size, X5 : Annual income, X6: Training exposure, X7 : Organizational participation, X8 : Extension media contact, X9 : Cosmopoliteness, Y: Adoption of improved rice cultivation practices Conclusions Sample farm ers had been using more or less the improved ri ce cultivation practices in their rice cultivation. Education, training exposure, organizational participation, extension media contact, cosmopoliteness had positively significant relationship with the adoption of improved rice cultivation practices. Low trained, organizational participation, extension media contact, cosmopoliteness and illiterate farm ers adopt ed less improved rice cultivation practices. With the increas e of thes e characteristics of the farm ers tends to increase their extent of adoption. References Adams, R.H. 1982. Non-Farm income, inequality and land in rural Egypt. World Bank Manuscript. Bashar. M.K. 1993. Adoption of Intercropping in Sugarcane Cultivation. MS. (Ag. Ext. Ed.) Thesis. Department of Agricultural Extension Education. Bangladesh Agricultural University. Diederen P.J.M., J.C.M. Van Meijl and A.M. Wolters. 2003. Modernisa-tion in agriculture : what makes a farmer adopt an innovation?,International Journal of Technology Management, (forthcoming). Hussen. M.A.M. 2001. Farmers' Knowledge and Adoption of Modern Sugarcane Cultivation Practices. M.S. (Ag. Ext. Ed.) Thesis, Department of Agricultural Extension Education. Bangladesh Agricultural University. IRRI. 1981. Proc. of a symposium on the Agrometereology of the rice crop. Los Banos, Philippines. Pal, S.K. I995. Adoption of R ecommended Sugarcane Cultivation Practices by the Farmers of Two Selected Centres of North Bengal Sugar Mills. M.S. (Ag. Ext. Ed.) Thesis. Department of Agricultural Extension Education, Bangladesh Agricultural University. Mymensingh, Bangladesh. Robert, O.V., V. Petrarca, P. Carnevale, L. Ovazza, and M. Coluzzi. 1989. Cytogenetic analysis of the Anopheles gambiae complex in the region of Bobo-Dioulasso (Burkina Faso). Ann. Parasit.hum. comp., 64: 290-311. Rogers, E.M. 1962. Diffusion of innovation among the free press, New York. Van den Ban, A.W. and H.S. Hawkins. 1996. Agricultural Extension: Second Edition, Blackwell Science Limited, London 40.
