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The adoption of cultivated forages in smallholder dairy systems offers a cost-effective way to increase the productivity of livestock. The Kenyan and Ethiopian governments have both stated an ambition to increase the use of forages in their dairy sectors; however, policies have failed to produce widespread results. Existing research tends to focus on local barriers to forage adoption and not the wider innovation environment. To fill this literature gap, this study uses a Tobit model to analyse village-level data from Kenya and Ethiopia in 2015. A potentially important relationship between milk buyers and forage intensity in Ethiopia, which has not previously been addressed in the literature, is identified. As the Ethiopian government dominates the forage sector, the results of this study indicate that private milk buyers may offer an alternative source of information. In the Kenyan context, this paper finds that informal institutions and farmer-to-farmer information transmission are important in adoption decisions and should be considered when designing extension strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the post-Green Revolution era, numerous improved wheat varieties were released and disseminated to enhance tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses and increase productivity. Still, in the wheat-based farming systems of the Global South, gender-based and other social inequalities continue to undermine equitable access to improved varieties, especially for women, poor, and marginalized farmers. Here, we present a case for gender-sensitive technology development, dissemination, and evaluation as part of wheat varietal improvement programs. We take stock of the various challenges that persist in the uptake of modern wheat varieties by male and female smallholders. We focus on Ethiopia and India, two geographies with substantive wheat economies, widespread poverty, and gender inequalities. The socio-economic literature on wheat is relatively thin with limited and dated gender-sensitive evaluation studies on varietal technologies in these countries. Varietal technology evaluations could ideally cover gender differences in relation to wheat varietal trait preferences, technology adoption, and associated decision-making and labor-use changes related to new varieties and complementary technologies, as well as nutritional and economic benefits. The paper calls for a need to change the institutional arrangements in wheat research-and-development (R&D) programs to understand and pursue better paths for wheat improvement to proactively contribute toward gender equity and inclusivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In spite of the availability of several improved agricultural technologies generated by the research system in Ethiopia over the last four decades, adoption of these innovations by smallholder farmers has been very low. This has led to stagnation of agricultural productivity and low crop yields, exposing the country to recurrent food shortfalls and national food insecurity. The old approach to agricultural research emphasized developing new technologies mainly through on-station research that were then supposed to reach farmers through the public-sector extension system. The Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research (EIAR) has in recent years introduced a shift in agricultural research for development, which is based on the innovation systems approach that involved cultivating partnerships with several actors along the value chain, especially farmers, farmers' cooperatives and input suppliers. This paper presents the methodology used to facilitate agricultural innovations and the diffusion of new technologies and illustrates the outcomes of this initiative with regard to technology adoption, productivity growth and the market orientation of production. The authors use examples from experiences in scaling up three grain legumes. Compared to the three-year baseline average (2003–05), crop output increased nationally by 89%, 85% and 97% in 2008 for common bean, chickpea and lentil respectively. Nationally, 53–59% of the output growth is attributable to yield growth due to technological change, while the balance is due to area expansion. These results affirm that the new approach has led to accelerated adoption of new and high-yielding or low-risk varieties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The question of whether the intended gains in food production from new varieties have actually been realized by poor farmers has received little or no attention in the literature. This paper used a stochastic frontier efficiency decomposition methodology to derive the technical, allocative and economic efficiency measures for a sample of hybrid maize producers in western Ethiopia. The results revealed considerable underexploitation of the yield and profitability potentials of hybrid maize and indicated that farmers could increase production by an average of 26% if they all adopted the recommended management practices. Furthermore, adoption of the recommended management practices coupled with optimum use of inputs, especially fertilizer, would enable the farmers to reduce production costs by an average of 39%. Education, provision of input credit, and timely availability of critical inputs are positively and significantly related to the efficiency of hybrid maize production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]