Farmer field preparation and tillage practices. Implications for fertilizer technology research

The purpose of this paper is to show how information from diagnostic research on small farmer decision-making about land preparation and tillage pratices may be integrated into experimental research on the design and evaluation of fertilizer technology. Analysis of different land preparation and tillage practices used by farmers in cassava production in Cauca department, Colombia is utilized to develop a model of farmers' decision-making in the choice of tillage techniques.

The decision model indicates that manual tillage practices which involve only partial field tillage are a response to relatively fixed constraints, which imply that it may be difficult for farmers facing these constraints to adopt fertilizer technology which requires full field tillage. Variables associated with choice of tillage method are identified and related to implications for experimental evaluation of fertilizer technology and the distribution of benefits from this research. The findings illustrate that diagnostic research on the agro-socioeconomic constraints faced by small farmers can alert researchers to limiting factors which require recognition in the design and testing of agricultural technology, in order to facilitate rapid and effective adoption by a majority of small farmers.