The Role of Extension and Information in the Adoption of Integrated Soil Fertility Practices and Impacts on Farmers' Welfare: Evidence from a Randomized Controlled Trial in Ethiopia
Final Report Abstract
This project analyzed the adoption as well as impacts of adoption of an agricultural system technology called ‘integrated soil fertility management’ (ISFM) among Ethiopian smallholders. ISFM is now broadly promoted to enhance soil fertility, agricultural productivity and rural livelihoods in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The core of ISFM is the combined use of organic and inorganic fertilizers with improved seeds, alongside other site-specific soil fertility practices. System technologies such as ISFM are typically knowledge-intensive, as they require the understanding of at least basic underlying biological processes, and the adaptation of practices to local agri-environmental conditions. Evidence shows that farmers delay in particular the uptake of such complex system technologies, or tend to scatter individual practices across plots rather than using them in an integrated manner. On the one hand, information and knowledge constraints are likely to play an important role in explaining incomplete or non-adoption of system technologies. On the other hand, applying these technologies usually goes along with additional capital and labor demand, and it is unclear whether these pay off for rural households. Agricultural extension should bridge knowledge gaps as its overarching goal is information transfer from researchers to farmers. In most of SSA, extension models have become more decentralized and participatory and thus rely on effective farmer-to-farmer learning, while increasingly including nontraditional forms of education. Against this background, our first research objective is to assess the effects of “farmer-to-farmer” extension and a video intervention on the adoption of the ISFM technology package. The study is based on a randomized controlled trial using data from 2,382 smallholders in Ethiopia. Both extension-only and extension combined with video increase adoption and knowledge of the package, especially of its more complex components; on average, however, the video intervention has no additional effect on adoption. Knowledge and the number of adopted practices also increase among farmers not actively participating in group-based extension activities, which suggests information diffusion. For this group, the additional video intervention has a reinforcing effect, and particularly fosters adoption of the integrated package. Overall, these results point towards the existence of information spillovers within communities, and thus provide support for the rationale of farmer-to-farmer extension models to promote even complex agricultural technologies. Yet, for those farmers not actively involved in farmer-to-farmer extension activities, complementary information provision via video seems a valuable method to counterbalance incomplete information diffusion and ultimately foster adoption. Our second research objective is to assess the plot and household-level effects of adopting ISFM core components (organic fertilizer, inorganic fertilizer and improved seeds) for the three major staples maize, wheat and teff. At the plot level, analyses show that all ISFM practices and their combinations increase land and labor productivity, despite higher labor demand, with the largest effects stemming from the joint use of all three core practices. Effects on net crop value are positive for most combinations, but suggest that organic fertilizer with improved seeds may be more beneficial compared to combinations with inorganic fertilizer; most likely since this combination does not involve costs for externally sourced inorganic fertilizer while still entailing substantial yield gains. Organic fertilizer appears particularly important in the dry agroecology, underlining the importance of moisture-retaining practices in drier areas. At the household level, findings show that adopting ISFM core components for maize, wheat or teff is associated with higher labor demand as well as income obtained from these crops in two different agroecological zones. Yet, only in one agroecological region, it also goes along with enhanced household income, food security and school enrollment. By contrast, in the other region, technology adoption for at least one of the three main crops is related to a reduced likelihood of engaging in other economic activities, pointing towards labor reallocation effects. We conclude that welfare outcomes of agricultural innovations can be heterogeneous depending on farmers’ income diversification strategies and agroecological environment. Thus, it appears important for agricultural policies not to focus on yield effects alone when promoting (sets of) agricultural practices. Instead, recommendations should consider the full range of heterogeneous farm types, agroecological conditions as well as resources available at the farm level. This also means taking farmers’ livelihood strategies into account to foresee possible resource allocation conflicts at the household level, and potentially supporting measures such as the development of sharing and rental arrangements for labor-saving mechanization equipment.
Publications
- (2021). Integrated soil fertility management and household welfare in Ethiopia. Food Policy 100, 102022: 1-14
Hörner D. & Wollni, M.
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodpol.2020.102022) - (2021). Knowledge and adoption of complex agricultural technologies – Evidence from an extension experiment. The World Bank Economic Review 36 (1): 68-90
Hörner, D., Bouguen, A., Frölich, M. & Wollni, M.
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1093/wber/lhab025) - (2021). The Effects of Decentralized and Video-based Extension on the Adoption of Integrated Soil Fertility Management – Experimental Evidence from Ethiopia. NBER Working Paper 26052, July 2019
Hörner, D., Bouguen, A., Frölich, M. & Wollni, M.
(See online at https://doi.org/10.3386/w26052) - (2022). Does integrated soil fertility management increase returns to land and labor? Agricultural Economics: 1-19
Hörner, D. & Wollni, M.
(See online at https://doi.org/10.1111/agec.12699)
