Farmers' Perception of Sawah Rice Production Technology in Nigeria

This paper examined farmers' perception of Sawah rice production technology in Nigeria. Using a large sample size technique of n > 30, forty farmers were selected and interviewed. A structured questionnaire with a reliability coefficient of 0 .85 wa s u sed to elicit information on socio-economic cha racteristics a nd fa rm characteristics. Farmers' perception of the various sawah activities was calculated using the five point Likert scale. Descriptive statistics was used to describe the data on the socio-economic characteristics of the farmers, while multiple regression analysis was used to isolate socio-economic characteristics influencing perception. The results shows that 74.5percent of the farmers fall between age 18 years and 50 years, 97.90 percent of the respondents are males, 93.60 percent married, 34 percent have no formal education, and 70.2 percent have sawah farm size between 1ha and 13ha. Significant determinants were age (t = 1.90), occupation (t = 1.71), farm size (t = 2.85), membership of association (t = 3.36) and knowledge of sawah technology (t = 2.93). It, therefore, implies that the farmers' perception of the sawah rice production technology must be viewed within the prevailing socio- economic and farming system milieu of farmers in order to enhance continuous adoption and sustained profit from sawah technology.