Comparative Study of the Agro-Innovation Adoption among Members and Non-Members of Agricultural Cooperatives in Nigeria

Abstract

This study compares the level of awareness and adoption of innovative agricultural technologies among members and non-members of cooperative societies. This is to direct policies on the diffusion and adoption of agricultural technologies to facilitate increased food production as Nigeria’s economy strives for post-COVID-19 survival and recovery. A multistage technique was used to select a sample of 320 constituting 160 cooperative members and 160 non-cooperative members. Structured questionnaires were used to collect primary data, which was then analysed using both descriptive (Mean, standard deviation) and inferential (regression, ANOVA) statistics. The results suggest that awareness and adoption of new agricultural technologies are higher among members of cooperatives compared to non-members. This study advocates that cooperative societies are veritable vehicles for innovation diffusion. Some challenges of the farmers were explored, and the study recommended that new technologies should be introduced through cooperatives using Small Plots Adoption trial (SPAT) and increased deployment of extension workers to farmers. Furthermore, Cooperative farmers and non-cooperative farmers should be persuaded by the extension workers in ADP to attend agricultural exhibitions where the farm outputs of new technologies are displayed together with the outputs of the old technologies so that they can see the obvious difference and adopt the new technologies.