Abstract:
Soybean is a legume crop grown in the tropical, subtropical, and temperate climates which
is used for food and animal feed. However, the production and productivity of soybean is
low and improvement in production and productivity depends on the extent to which a
household has applied the recommended production technologies. The objectives of this
study were: to assess the level of adoption of improved soybean production technology and
to identify the major factors affecting adoption of improved soybean production
technology. Multi stage sampling procedure was followed to select 123 households for the
study. In this study, descriptive and inferential statistical methods were used to describe
household characteristics and adoption of the technologies among households. Tobit
model was used in order to identify the determinants of adoption of the improved soybean
production technologies. The results of descriptive statistics showed that a total of hundred
(77%) of the respondents have adopted the recommended soybean production
technologies. The result of the econometric model indicated that the age of the households,
the land holding, household size, the number of livestock owned and the extension contact
are important variables influencing the level of adoption of soybean technologies. Thus it
is recommended that policy options be implemented among soybean producers addressing
the disparity in the level of adoption of the technologies. In so doing, it would be
worthwhile to take into consideration the personal characteristics, resource ownership
and technical capacity of the farmers as drivers of soybean technology adoption
