Making conservation tillage conventional, building a future on 25 years of research: research and extension perspective.

Although no-till (NT) has shown numer ous advantages over conventional tillage methods, the technology has shown r elatively slow adoption rates in many r egions of the world. In this paper , some of the r easons for slow adoption are analyzed. Mindset is pr obably among the biggest obstacles to expanded no-till use. Knowledge is also among the main constraints to expanded NT adop­ tion. Although r esearch has generated copious knowl­ edge, this knowledge is often not r eaching the farmer . Sometimes conditions for the utilization of technology ar e not met. Technology diffusion investigations show that farmer-to-farmer extension is one of the most ef fective ways of achieving rapid adoption of innovations. A greater effort has to be made in cr eating societal awar e­ ness of the many positive effects of NT , not only for farmers themselves but for society as a whole. Resear ch priorities should be dir ected towards intensifying work with green manure cover crops, crop rotations, biological control of diseases, pests and weeds, soil biology , adapta­ tion of NT to site-specific conditions using a systems approach and on-farm r esearch. The technology should also be developed fur ther for small farmers and r esearch should be done with a gr eater variety of cr ops in order to widen the possibilities of cr op rotations. Finally a gr eater effort has to be made in analyzing the economics of NT in a systems appr oach, taking all on-farm and off-farm benefits of the system into consideration.