Abstract:
Timely access to market information would increasingly enable smallholder farmers to
make timely, reliable, realistic and viable decisions. Information and Communication
Technologies (ICTs) play an important role in this regard. This study was intended to
assess factors affecting use of information and communication technologies for cereal
marketing in Dembecha woreda. Random sample of 150 households were selected from
four purposively selected kebeles. Descriptive statistics, inferential statistics and binary
logistic regression model were used for analyzing the data. Among the 150 sample
respondents, 101 (67.3%) were ICTs users while 49 (32.7%) were not. Eleven variables
were included in the model of which six variables were found significant at less than 5
percent probability level. Years of education, total annual income, distance from nearest
electric power source, participating in training, solar power use and credit use were found
to be significant variables influencing use of ICTs for cereal marketing. Lack of
availability of electricity power, cost of mobile phone (cards, charging), lack of knowledge
and skill for operating mobile phone applications were the major challenges to use mobile
phone. The announced prices were not offered in local markets and high battery cost was
the major challenges to use radio. Increased access to affordable power sources such as
solar power and increased access to inexpensive ICTs were some opportunities for ICTs
use. It could be concluded that the more farmers are educated and trained coupled with
higher income, nearer to electric power source, solar power and credit user, the better the
tendency to use ICTs for cereal marketing. Therefore, it is recommended that, rural
electric service should be established which will definitely boost ICT investment in rural
areas. There is also a need to ensure that efforts are concentrated more on renewable
energy sources like solar power because they are relatively cheap and sustainable
