Assessment of production practices of smallholder potato (Solanum tuberosum l.) farmers in Wolaita zone, southern Ethiopia

Abstract

Background: Potato plays a great role for the achievement of food security program due to its plasticity to environ-mental conditions and yielding capacity. However, its productivity is far less than other countries due to constraints threatening subsistence farms in Ethiopia. Therefore, potato production practices by smallholder farmers were assessed in Wolaita zone of southern Ethiopia to identify major factors constraining production of the crop. Data were collected at two stages, i.e., at a pilot survey and the time of basic data collection. Descriptive statistics, multiple linear regression, and index ranking were used to analyze the data. Results: The descriptive statistical revealed that smallholder farmers have very small land (about 0.5 ha per house-hold). Low access to and high prices of seed tubers of improved potato varieties (>0.25 USD kg−1 seed tubers) and scarcity of information on good fertilizer management practices for producing the crop with only a blanket rate of 147 and 135 kg ha−1 of urea and diammonium phosphate, respectively, limit potato production in the area. Further-more, prevalence of diseases and low market prices of tubers at harvesting, but too expensive during planting period are the major constraints of potato production in the zone. In addition, results of the multiple regression analysis indicated that the occurrence of natural hazards, seeding rate and expensive price of improved seed tubers were important factors significantly influence potato productivity in Wolaita area. Likewise, disease problems, low market price of potato at harvesting time, storage problems, and lack of seed tubers were the four major constraints identi-fied by index ranking. Conclusions: Results of this study revealed that potato production is constrained by a number of factors among which diseases, storage problems, low market prices of tubers at harvest, and insufficient quality seed tubers for planting were the four major constraints challenging potato production in the study area according to the index ranking method.