Adoption of multiple sustainable land management practices and its effects on productivity of smallholder maize farmers in Nigeria

Abstract

The problem of land degradation has resulted into low agricultural productivity over the last two decades in Nigeria thus encouraging sustainable land management practices. Thus, we examined the determinants of choice of sustainable land management practices and the factors influencing the adoption of multiple sustainable land management practices including the effects of adoption of sustainable land management practices on maize productivity using endogenous switching regression model (ESRM) in Nigeria. The result of the multivariate probit model found that gender, household size, marital status, farming experience, farm size, years of formal education, access to extension contacts, access to credit and owning a land influenced the maize farmers’ decision to choose between the different sustainable land management practices. The result of the ordered probit model showed that gender, marital status, farming experience, access to extension contacts, access to credit and owning a land influenced farmers decision to adopt multiple sustainable land management practices. Furthermore, the results of the effect of variables such as age, gender, marital status, farming experience, farm size, membership in association and access to extension services translates into increased maize productivity for the maize farmers who adopted sustainable land management practices. The result of the IPWRA showed that adoption of SLMP improves the productivity of the maize farmers. Enacting policy measures that will promote the adoption of SLMP where there is an improvement in farmers having access to financial support and improved extension services towards the smallholder farmers is required. • The negative impact of land degradation has been severe in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) countries including Nigeria. • Many lands remain uncultivable due to land degradation problems in Nigeria. • Adoption of Sustainable land management practices is of necessity to address the negative impact of land degradation. • Productivity of maize can be enhanced through appropriate adoption of sustainable land management practices.