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The aim of the research is to evaluate the adoption of agricultural innovations and sources of information in dairy cattle farms. The data were obtained by administering a questionnaire to 70 dairy farms in Bafra and Canik districts of Samsun. The results of the research showed that knowledge and innovations in dairy cattle farms are not sufficiently adopted and traditional methods are commonly applied. Nearly half of the dairy cattle owners (47.1%) stated that they were aware of the trainings related to dairy cattle breeding, while others did not. The most important reason for those being aware of the training programs but not participating was that they believed that they had enough information about dairy cattle with 51.5%. Other reasons were that they received information from neighboring farmers (27.3%) and did not find enough time to participate in the trainings (21.2%). The most preferred sources of information about innovations related to dairy cattle were family members (72.9%), and neighboring farmers (67.1%); and the most preferred extension method among mass media methods was television (87.1%). The applicability of agricultural knowledge and innovations transferred to dairy cattle farmers and their adoption will significantly change the understanding of production in rural society. Developing positive attitude towards knowledge and innovation will lead to the elimination of wrong practices and facilitate the transformation of dairy farms to a modern structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study was specifically conducted in the four districts of Punjab province of Pakistan. The principal objective was to identify major explanatory variables that might influence dairy farmers’ market participation decisions regarding the selection of traditional and modern channels of milk marketing. Data was collected from field survey and the sample size comprised of 320 dairy farmers, randomly selected from study area. Multinomial logit model was used an econometric tool to estimate the impacts of fourteen independent variables on the dependent variable (selection of milk marketing channel). Model results showed that eight factors like gender, old aged farmers, long distance between dairy farm and urban market, easy milk selling at door step, advance cash payment, lack of quality inspection, strong social relationship with milk collectors, and better milk price were important predictors influencing milk producers to choose traditional channels for the sale of their milk produce. Impacts of these variables were significant at 5% of significance level except long distance which was significant at 1%. Conversely to this, fourfactors such as high education level of dairy farmers, large herd size, provision of extension services, and purchase of evening milk were motivating dairy farmers to sell milk through modern channels. Traditional milk channels were preferred by majority of milk producers but these channels were lacking in delivering the quality milk to consumers. Policy implication for sustainable milk marketing might be the provision of dairy advisory services, advance payment framework, improving logistic infrastructure, and enforcement of milk quality inspection could ensure milk safety along sustainable milk supply.