Adoption Status of Improved Production Technology in Rice
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Archives of Agriculture and Environmental Science 6(2): 178-185 (2021) https://doi.org/10.26832/24566632.2021.060209 This content is available online at AESA Archives of Agriculture and Environmental Science Journal homepage: journals.aesacademy.org/index.php/aaes e-ISSN: 2456-6632 ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE Adoption status of improved production technology in rice cultivation in Kanchanpur, Nepal Ankit Pokhrel1* , Suman Dhakal2, Rojina Kafle1 and Aayush Pokhrel1 1Faculty of Agriculture, Agriculture and Forestry University, Rampur, Chitwan - 44200, Bagmati Province, NEPAL 2Assistant Professor, Department of Agronomy, Agriculture and Forestry University Rampur, Chitwan - 44200, Bagmati Province, NEPAL *Corresponding author’s E-mail: [email protected] ARTICLE HISTORY ABSTRACT Received: 13 April 2021 A study was carried out in 2020 to assess the scenario of the improved production technolo- Revised received: 20 May 2021 gies among rice growers in Kanchanpur and to identify the factors influencing the adoption of Accepted: 18 June 2021 these technologies. The simple random sampling procedure was used to collect data from 90 respondents using a semi-structured interview schedule from Belauri, Bhimdutta municipality, and Beldandi rural municipality which are under the command area of the rice super zone, Keywords Kanchanpur. The information on prevailing cultural practice, production, and productivity, Binary logit regression adoption of improved technology, problems/constraints faced by farmers in rice cultivation in Production practices the study area were collected from the farmers by interview. The data were processed, Rice cultivation cleaned, and analyzed using software MS-excel and SPSS. The simple descriptive and inferen- tial statistics like chi-square and binary logistic regression models were used to find the rela- tionship between dependent and independent variables. Respondents adopted plant protec- tion measures (chemical weed control, insects, and disease control) and seed treatment relatively less than they adopted recommended variety, Seed Replacement Rate (SRR), and storage treatment. The majority of the respondents were affiliated with the farmers’ groups but the majority of them had not received training. Furthermore, spade, hoe, tractor, thresher, sickle, wooden plough bullock cart water pumps, tillers, reapers were used by respondents. Binary logistic regression revealed that membership of agriculture group, advice from agricul- ture technician, training, visit of extension workers and rice cultivated land had a positive and significant effect on the adoption of various production practices. Inadequate availability of fertilizers and inputs (0.85), Inadequate training (0.68), inadequate machinery availability (0.54) were the major constraints faced by the farmers on rice cultivation. ©2021 Agriculture and Environmental Science Academy Citation of this article: Pokhrel, A., Dhakal, S., Kafle, R., & Pokhrel, A. (2021). Adoption status of improved production technology in rice cultivation in Kanchanpur, Nepal. Archives of Agriculture and Environmental Science, 6(2), 178-185, https://dx.doi.org/10.26832/24566632.2021.060209 INTRODUCTION respectively in terms of the World's production (USDA, 2018). Nepal is predominantly an agricultural country. Rice is grown worldwide in almost 100 countries on 165 million Agriculture is the backbone of Nepal's economy. It has contrib- hectares with a total production of 750 MT (IRRI, 2019). It ranks uted to about 27.6% of the total GDP of Nepal (CBS, 2017). Rice second in the world in terms of production after maize (FAO, is the major cereal produced in 1.49 million hectares with a 2010). It is used as a staple food by more than 60% of the total production of 5.61 million tons (MOALD, 2020). It contributes world's population (FAO, 2010) More than 90% of the world's 27% to the total AGDP and 7% to the national GDP (CDD, rice production is concentrated in the Asia continent. Among 2017). them, China (214 MT) and India (172MT) rank 1st and 2nd Rice is the major staple food in Nepal. Rice is grown from the Ankit Pokhrel et al. /Arch. Agric. Environ. Sci., 6(2): 178-185 (2021) 179 lowland of terai to high hills in Nepal (Sapkota et al., 2011). It has MATERIALS AND METHODS immense contribution to food security. It fulfills 50% of the total grain requirement and 30% of the total calorie requirement of Description of the study area the country (Dhungel and Acharya, 2017). The population of The study was conducted in Kanchanpur district situated in the Nepal is increasing at the rate of 1.25% per annum and to meet far- western province between latitude 28°32" to 29°28" and the demand of the growing population Nepal is importing almost longitude 80°3" to 80°33" (District Profile, 2018) Bhimdutta and 215 thousand tons of rice annually. The statistics reveal that Belauri municipality and Beldandi rural municipality were rice production has decreased by 1.2% from the year 2015 to purposively chosen because these sites were major rice- 2016 (CBS, 2017). Kanchanpur district follows the Rice-Wheat producing areas in Kanchanpur and easily accessible (Figure 1). cropping system in which rice is cultivated in 46,215 ha with a A preliminary study was carried out to collect information production of 164,803 tons and productivity of 3.88 tons ha-1 regarding the feasibility of the study by direct field observation (MOALD, 2020). Spring rice is also in cultivation in area less and informal conversation with farmers that provided insight than 700 ha with a productivity of 4.48 tons ha-1 (MOALD, regarding questionnaire preparation and rapport building. 2020). It is very essential to determine the target population, determi- Despite having access to markets, suitable topography, and nation of the sampling procedure, and deciding the rational having 89.74% irrigated land, the production of rice in Kanchan- sample size for research work. Estimate of farmers growing rice pur district has not met the actual production potential of the under the command area of rice super zone was obtained from district (Zone Profile, 2018). The main reason for not having the the office of PMAMP PIU rice super zone and Agriculture anticipated production of rice might be the poor adoption of Knowledge Centre (AKC) Kanchanpur and the sampling frame improved production technology by the rice-growing farmers. was made of 1000 farmers. A total of 90 households were Low productivity might be the result of high level of subsistence selected based on simple random sampling. Simple random farming, poor adoption of suitable on-farm and postharvest sampling was adopted to avoid biases as this provides an equal technology as well as the availability of inputs (seeds, fertilizers, chance for the selection of elements from the sampling frame. chemicals, irrigation, machinery) (MOAD, 2015). These factors The questionnaire was prepared in English language and was including ineffective research, poor integration of research and asked in Nepali for better information gathering from farmers. extension, Inadequate training, lack of production credit have The information on prevailing cultural practice, production, and resulted in poor adoption of the improved production technolo- productivity, adoption of improved technology, problems/ gy (Shamsudeen et al., 2018). constraints faced by farmers on the adoption of improved rice Commonly, the major problems related to the low productivity production technology in the study area were collected from the of rice is associated with inadequate use of the improved farmers by interview. varieties, poor weed control, lack of inorganic fertilizer A total of 3 Focus Group Discussions (FGD) were conducted application, poor tillage operation, labor-intensive cultivation, using a pre-determined semi-structured checklist to supplement lack of suitable hybrid varieties, and poor irrigation (Umar et al., and verify the information collected from the household survey. 2010). In Kanchanpur district, it had been noted that labor is Farmers from all cultural, gender, and ethnic backgrounds were scarce due to the emigration of youths to India in search of included. Key informant interview (KII) was conducted with employment opportunities. So, the cost of labor is increasing progressive farmers, farmer leaders, managers of private farms, ultimately increasing the cost of cultivation. The use of and local extension workers to seek some key information about machines like power tillers, tractors, threshers will help to the overall trend of rice cultivation in the study area. The reduce cost of cultivation and saves time (Acharya and secondary data were collected by reviewing different publica- Bhandari, 2017). tions from government and non-government organizations and In this context, this study assessed the current situation of the co-operatives, reports from national organizations MOALD, improved farm production technology as well as evaluated the PMAMP, ADS, CBS, AKC, etc. status of farm mechanization used by the farmers in rice cultiva- tion. The factors associated with technology adoption and Variables and their measurements mechanization were studied. The importance of this study was to generate and provide information to technology developers, Dependent variables: The dependent variable in this study was policymakers as well as extension workers to take decisions the adoption of improved rice production technology. The concerning rice production in the area of study. The contribu- selected dependent