Impact of push-pull technology on the nutritional status of farmers’ children in western Kenya

This study examined the impact of push-pull technology (PPT) on the nutritional status of children aged 1-12 years. Non-push-pull (NPPT) farmers were used as a control group to establish a comparative model for this study. It determined household production, consumption, and surpluses, comparing the PPT adopters to the nonadopters; found out the incomes and food expenditures from farm products; found out the household dietary diversity scores; and finally found the nutritional status of the two household groups. A six faceted household-level metrics was employed. A sample of 216 households that registered 326 children was derived. This study was conducted in western Kenya: Busia, Butere, Siaya, Vihiga, Kisumu, and Migori. In this study 53% were male and 47% female from the households assessed. Households with married couples were 87.5%, 1.9% were single parents, 0.5% were separated and 10.2% were widowed. Averagely, 7.20 members came from PPT households, while 6.99 were from NPPT households. Each household (both PPT and NPPT) had an average number of three children. The study further showed that 88 households of PPT had their income sources from farm products sales as NPPT had 67 households on the same. Income was averagely 126.29US$for PPT and 91US$ for NPPT. Push-pull households had 1303 Kgs of farm production while NPPT had 578 Kgs per year. The scale of agriculture to nutrition benefits recorded 8.7/10 for PPT and 7.14/10 for NPPT. Finally, PPT registered 12% of ≥+2SD, 84% of between -2 and > +2SD and 4% of ≤ -2SD for children under five years and 3% of ≥+2SD, 89% of between -2 and > +2SD and 8% of ≤ -2SD for children aged between 6 to 12 years. Non Push-pull households controversially registered 3% of ≥+2SD, 61% of between -2 and > +2SD and 36% of ≤ -2SD for children less than five years and 3% of ≥+2SD, 53% of between -2 and > +2SD and 44% of ≤ 2SD for children aged between 6 to 12 years. In conclusion, PPT is proven as an agricultural intervention that has enhanced nutritional improvement.Keywords: Push-pull Technology (PPT), Non Push-pull Technology (NPPT), nutrition, dietary diversity, food security, Body Mass Index (BMI), agricultur

Gender appropriateness of field days in knowledge generation and adoption of push-pull technology in eastern Africa

Adoption studies have identified gender as one of the factors that determine technology uptake and this has been linked to women’s access to farming information or lack of it. Technology scaling up systems should utilise pathways that are compatible with the needs of rural women, who have to juggle farming with other household chores. Unfortunately, there has been limited effort to evaluate the suitability of the information pathways used to specific gender. The current study evaluates the appropriateness of field days with respect to gender of the participants. Data were collected from selected farmers who attended field days in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania in 2014. A total of 2 615 participants were interviewed out of 6 221 who attended field days. Descriptive analysis and ordered probit and logit models were used for analysis. The majority of the participants in Kenya and Tanzania were women (51.3% and 62.6%, respectively), whereas in Uganda the majority of participants were men (57.4%). Most participants were middle aged (42 years for women and 45 years for men). The majority of the women (54.1%) had primary level education, with only 29.1% having secondary education, whereas 41% and 40.1% of men had attained primary and secondary education, respectively. The results from the econometric models shows that gender, age, education, being push-pull farmers, perceptions on Striga severity were the main significant determinants of knowledge for the ordered probit. Conversely, gender of the participant, perception on stemborers and Striga weed severity and having mobile phones were the significant determinants of willingness to adopt. The two models were significant at 1% (p < 0.001). The significance of the gender variable in the two models shows that women farmers understood more about push-pull (coefficient of ordered probit = −0.112) when trained during field days. Furthermore, the willingness to adopt push-pull after the training was much higher for women (coefficient of logit = −0.367) compared with men. The findings demonstrate that field days can be more appropriate for training farmers, especially women who are often disadvantaged in information access, as a result of their socio-economic circumstances

Gender specific perceptions and adoption of the climate-smart push–pull technology in eastern Africa

AbstractThe performance of the agricultural sector in many developing countries has been rated as below average, in particular the staple cereal crops whose productivity is limited by both biotic and abiotic factors. Furthermore, underperformance by the agricultural sector has in part been attributed to the inability of women to access resources, yet they represent a crucial resource in agriculture and the rural economy through their roles as farmers and entrepreneurs. These challenges can be overcome by understanding gender roles and perceptions, and aligning innovations to fit the preferences of specific gender. This study evaluated gender specific perceptions and the extent of adoption of a climate-smart push–pull technology for controlling stemborers, African witch weed (Striga spp.), and improving soil fertility in drier agro-ecological zones where these constraints are quickly spreading. The findings show that slightly higher percentage of women (98.6%) perceived the technology as effective compared to men (96.7%). Women also highly rated the beneficial attributes of the technology such as increased cereal production (97.3% of the women vs 94.6% of men), decline in Striga spp. weed (97.2% women vs 92.4% of men), increase in soil fertility (95.9% of women vs 90% of men), increase in fodder production (94.1% of women vs 91.3% of men) and increase in cereal and fodder production even with drought (82.3% of women vs 66.5% of men). The findings show that, women who are the most vulnerable of the smallholder farmers, are bound to benefit from the technology, mostly because its attributes favors their (women) preferences

Potential uptake determinants of climate-smart push-pull technology in drier agro-ecological zones of eastern Africa

The adaptation of push-pull technology to the drier ecological zones is of critical importance for its sustainability in view of the effects of global climate change. While intensified dissemination of the climate-smart technology would ensure its maximum adoption, knowledge of its potential adoption is necessary before dissemination resources are commitment. Potential adoption of a technology is however based on a wide range of farm, farmer, institutional and socioeconomic characteristics. This study was interested on these determinants of potential adoption of the climate-smart push-pull ex ante. The study adopted the multinomial logit technique to evaluate potential adoption determinants, and the findings were consistent with expectations based on theoretical hypothesis with gender, striga rating, push-pull awareness, input market access and country dummy variables being the significant predictors of the potential adoption. These findings are critical if effective targeting of the dissemination messages is to be accomplished

Gender appropriateness of field days in knowledge generation and adoption of push-pull technology in eastern Africa

Women are taking over the Agriculture sector in sub-Saharan Africa and policies that enhance their empowerment in farming would have positive gains in enhancing food security and transforming lives. Adoption studies have identified gender as one of the factors that determine technology uptake, and this has been linked to women’s access to farming information or lack of it. Technology scaling up systems should utilize pathways that are compatible with the needs of rural women who have to juggle farming with other household chores. Unfortunately, there has been limited effort to evaluate the suitability of the information pathways used to specific gender. This study evaluates the appropriateness of field days with respect to gender of the participants. A total of 2,615 participants were interviewed out of 6,221 who attended field days in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. The determinants of level knowledge level gained and willingness to adopt was evaluated using an ordered probit and logit model. Our findings shows that majority of the participants were women (51.3%), middle aged (40-45 years) and with primary level education (54.1% women). The model results shows that women farmers understood more about push-pull (coefficient of ordered probit = -0.112) and were more willing to adopt push-pull (coefficient of logit = -0.367). Age, education, being a push-pull farmer, perception of Striga severity and having a mobile phone were also significant. Our findings demonstrate that field days are appropriate for training farmers especially women who are often disadvantaged in information access