Factors Affecting Adoption of Improved Soybean Production Technology in Dewas District of Madhya Pradesh, India

Abstract

The oilseed legume soy, after groundnut and rapeseed & mustard, has become India's third-most significant oilseed crop in terms of area, production and productivity over the past 40 years. The bulk of India's tiny and marginal farming communities were transformed socio-economically by the use of soybeans, which also made a considerable contribution to the country's oil economy. Production technology for this miracle crop is also continuously upgrading with time. Thus, the present investigation was conducted in five villages of Kannod block of Dewas district of Madhya Pradesh to look after the factors affecting adoption of improved soybean production technology. Six blocks make up the Dewas district: Bagli, Dewas, Kannod, Khategaon, Sonkatch, and Tonkhurd. Out of them, Kannod block was specifically chosen since, over the past 10 years, the area under soybean crop has increased while productivity has steadily decreased in this block. With the help of a structured interview schedule, data was collected purposely from 105 farmers. For calculating relationships between dependent and independent variables correlation coefficient was used. Results of the study revealed that out of thirteen variables, eleven variables were significantly and positively related with factors affecting adoption of Improved Soybean Production Technology. Two variables i.e. age and farming experience were found significantly and negatively related with factors affecting adoption of Improved Soybean Production Technology. Majority of soybean farmers 63.81% reflected medium level of adoption regarding improved production technology. In constraint analysis, lack of on-time availability of improved varieties of seed followed by higher cost of inputs (seed, insecticide, fertilizer and implements) were two major constraints faced by 70.48% and 59.05% soybean farmers respectively. These findings provide insights for future research on factors affecting adoption of improved production technology by soybean farmers.