Determinants of Maize (<i>Zea mays L.</i>) Varietal Turnover in Ethiopia

Abstract

While many smallholder farmers all over the developing countries have benefited from the introduction of first-generation green revolution cultivars that replaced lower-yielding landraces, adoption of second and third-generation cultivars offering improvements in yield, output quality, and stress resistance seems now to be occurring at a much slower pace. Most varietal adoption and impact assessment studies in the past have relied on farmers’ responses at household level surveys to estimate these indicators. Such method of ‘farmer elicitation’ to estimate varietal adoption can be fairly accurate in a setting where farmers are mostly planting seeds freshly purchased or acquired from the formal seed market as certified or truthfully labeled seed, and the seed system is well-functioning and effective in monitoring the quality and genetic identity of varieties being sold by the seed suppliers. Thus, this study focused on varietal turnover by calculating an index of the weighted average age of varieties grown by farmers in a given year (measured in years since release) and factors affecting this varietal turnover, using a recently collected DNA fingerprinting dataset. Secondary data from the household survey data collected by Central Statistical Agency were used in the analysis. The multiple linear regression models were used in identifying determinants of maize cultivars varietal turnover. Econometric results indicate that, Farmers’ experience in growing maize affects WA weakly and statistically significant and positive. This implies that more experienced farmers are refusing to change their varieties as they are small holders and so risk averse. Family size being positively affecting varietal turnover also implies that if the decision to cultivate a new variety requires consensus among key family members who are involved in farming, then idea generation and making decision may become more difficult and taking time, causing households to forgo varietal turnover in order to avoid disagreement.