An analysis of Socio-economic Factors Affecting theAdoption of Modern Conservation Tillage Technologies in Darab Region (An Application of Multinomial Logit Models)

To investigate factors affecting the adoption of conservation tillage systems, the tillage methods utilized by wheat producers in the central Darab county are categorized into conventional, reduced-tillage and no tillage systems. For this purpose, multinomial logit model approach using the stata software was applied to the data set collected by random cluster sampling method. The explanatory variables consisted of farmer’s age, farm land size, farmer’s level of education, farmer’s experience on conservation tillage methods, number of family members, off-farm employment, number of land parcels and farmer ‘s information on conservation tillage methods.The results indicated that some variables such as farmer ‘s level of education, farmer’s experience on conservation tillage methods, off-farm employment, farm land size and farmer’s information on conservation tillage systems have positive and significant effect on the adoption of reduced-tillage systems, while the variable of the number of land parcels has a negative and significant effect. Other variables such as the farmer’s age and the number of family members were found insignificants.

Keywords:

Technology adoption , Wheat , Conservation tillage , Multinomial logit model