Publications des agents du Cirad

Cirad

How risk influences the adoption of new technologies by farmers in low rainfall areas of North Africa ?

Alary V., Nefzaoui A., El Mourid M.. 2007. In : El-Beltagy Adel (ed.), Saxena Mohan C. (ed.), Tao Wang (ed.). Human and nature. Working together for sustainable development of drylands : Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Development of Drylands, 25-28 February 2006, Beijing China. Alep : ICARDA, p. 802-810. International Conference on Development of Drylands. 8, 2006-02-25/2006-02-28, Beijing (Chine).

Risk has long been considered as an important factor that reduces technology adoption. We propose to test different hypotheses regarding the effect of risk on the process of technology adoption by farmers in semi arid and arid areas of North Africa where drought risk is prevalent. The study concerns the introduction of spineless cactus-based alley cropping risk-reducing technology, and addresses how farmers' risk attitude influences the level of adoption of this technology. To test the influence of risk on the technology adoption a mathematical programming model, that maximizes the utility function of farmers under a set of agronomic, economic and institutional constraints, was developed. The results showed that repayment period limits more the adoption of spineless cactus-based alley cropping than farmers' risk attitude. The reduction (or increase) of the coefficient of risk aversion favours stocking (or de-stocking) of live animals in agro-pastoral systems. In contrast, small farmers, with income threshold close to survival level, have little room to adjust.

Mots-clés : cactaceae; afrique du nord

Communication de congrès

Agents Cirad, auteurs de cette publication :