The importance of chickpea, its farming system and determinant factors on technology adoption, North Shewa, Ethiopia.

Abstract

Chickpea is one of the major pulse crops produced for home consumption and income sources. Its productivity is low due to low attention on chickpea production improvement technologies. This study examined chickpea farming system and its production status in wheat-based farming system areas. The purposes of the study were to evaluate the farming system of chickpea, to identify the determinant factors on chickpea technology adoption, and to assess the importance of chickpea in the study area. Both primary and secondary data were used for the study. The primary data were obtained from a total of 230 randomly selected rural farmers in Ensaro district. Descriptive statistics and complementary log-log methods were used to assess the farming system and the adoption status of the improved varieties. Chick pea is one of the major crops produced and farmers allocated their farm for chickpea production and grow both local and improved varieties. Neighbor farmers, the district office of agriculture and Debre Birhan agricultural research center were the main sources of improved seeds. Chickpea producers obtained more grain yield and farm benefits and better position in household income and expenditure than the non-grower farmers. Farmers who used improved chickpea varieties gained more gross margins from chickpea compared with their counterparts. Farmers near to market, better contact with extension and access to agriculture-related trainings used improved chickpea production technologies. Chickpea contributed for availability of food, income and gross field benefits improvement for the grower farmers. The improved varieties provide more grain yield than the local. Strengthen extension farmers linkage and improve market access contribute for the improvements of chickpea production and rural household income in chickpea growing areas.