How does farmers’ characteristics affect their willingness to adopt agricultural innovation? The case of Biofortified Cassava in Oyo State, Nigeria

Adoption of new technology, especially as it relates to agricultural production has been considered to play an important role in improving food security in developing countries which Nigeria is one. Crop farmers, especially those that cultivate cassava often record high productivity but with increase in deficiencies of essential nutrients such as zinc, vitamin A, Iron among others, causing malnutrition and consequently, poor health of individuals. This study examined perception and determinants of rural farmers’ willingness to adopt biofortified ‘yellow’ cassava in Oyo State, Nigeria. Primary data employed in the study were obtained from 120 respondents which were selected using a multi-stage random sampling technique. Analysis of the socio-economic characteristics showed that the mean age of household heads in the area was 46.06±15.58 years while almost all the farmers had up to 17years of farming experience and above. With respect to the level awareness of biofortified cassava, almost all the respondents were aware of the biofortified cassava. Logit Regression Model result revealed that farmers’ willingness to adopt biofortified cassava in the study area was influenced mainly by gender, source of inputs, marital status, access to extension officer and membership of farmer organization. However, the constraints faced by the respondents reported were: the risks in adoption, access to credit and access to market while the least severe constraints were size of farm, access to information, tradition and extension officer. The study recommends that existing programmes that disburse agricultural input should be increased in the rural areas since the study found source of input to affect the adoption of biofortified cassava. This could be done by including the biofortified cassava stem in the inputs disbursed through the e-wallet agricultural policy. Keywords: Biofortified cassava; perception; willingness to adopt and logit model