Farmers’ Knowledge and Adoption of Soil Conservation Practices in North Central Nigeria: An Index-based Approach Farmers’ Knowledge and Adoption of Soil Conservation Practices in North Central Nigeria: An Index-based Approach

Abstract

Soil is the most crucial resource on which agriculture is based. Proper management of this valuable resource is vital to sustain long-term agricultural productivity. Farmers’ knowledge level and adoption of soil management practices have influenced agricultural productivity. This study therefore, investigated the farmers’ knowledge gap and adoption of soil conservation practices in North Central Nigeria. A four-stage random sampling technique was adopted for selecting 960 respondents from all the six states for the study. Structured questionnaire and interview schedule were used to elicit information from the respondents. Data collected were analyzed with both descriptive and inferential statistics such as frequency counts, percentages, and mean, standard deviation, and knowledge gap and adoption indexes. The overall results for the six states showed that 45.3% had low knowledge gap, 43.4% had medium knowledge gap, and only 11.3% had high and wider knowledge gap of soil conservation practices. Benue have the largest (52.3%) number of farmers with the lowest knowledge gap on soil conservation practices. Results showed that 37.2 and 38.6% of respondents had low and moderate adoption rate, respectively, while only 24.2% had high adoption rate of soil conservation practices. State-wise, Benue (0.74) had the highest adoption rate while Kogi (0.33) had the lowest. Adoption rate of soil conservation practices is significantly influenced by farmers’ knowledge level at varying degree. It is concluded that farmers’ knowledge gap and adoption of soil conservation practices ranges between low and medium with wide knowledge gap were found mostly in the areas of terracing, contour farming, conservation tillage, and vegetative barriers. The study recommend that training with result demonstration through agricultural extension services should be organized for farmers on soil conservation practices to bridge their knowledge gap, especially in the areas where wider gap was found and increases its adoption.