Farmers’ Adoption of System of Rice Intensification in Chanchaga Local Government Area of Niger State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study evaluated the adoption of System of rice intensification (SRI) among rice farmers in Chanchaga Local Government Area of Niger State, Nigeria. A 3-stage sampling technique was used to collect data for the study through a structured questionnaire and interview schedule administered to 200 rice farmers. The results indicated that the majority of the farmers were males (83.0%) and married (68.5%) with no formal education (50.5%). Mean age was 44.1 years, household size was 8.8 persons, farming experience of 16years, average monthly income was N590,000.00 and average farm size was 1.7 ha. The most adopted SRI production practice was fertilizer and herbicide application (100.0%), planting depth (91.5%) manual land cultivation and planting method (91.0%). The respondents were at different stages of adoption with accelerating growth, rotary weeding and use of organic fertilizer having positive adoption index of 0.972, 0.970 and 0.601, respectively. Level of adoption of SRI technologies was low (34.5%) with a positive perception. Major constraints to SRI technologies were high labor ( =3.27), non-awareness of SRI technologies ( =3.14) inadequate understanding of SRI ( =2.89). The profitability of SRI in rice cultivation was higher compared to the conventional method. Therefore, the provision of  more training and demonstration programmes and input subsidy should be encouraged to boost adoption of SRI for improved rice production. Keywords: Rice Intensification, Farming activities, Training, Chanchaga, System, Niger State