In light of the large number of empirical studies of agroforestry adoption published during the last decade, we believe it is time to take stock and identify general determinants of agroforestry adoption. In reviewing 120 articles on adoption of agricultural and forestry technology by small holders, we find five categories of factors that explain technology adoption within an economic framework: preferences, resource endowments, market incentives, biophysical factors, and risk and uncertainty. By selecting only empirical analyses that focus on agroforestry and related investments, we narrow our list down to 32 studies primarily from tropical areas. We apply vote-counting based meta-analysis to these studies and evaluate the inclusion and significance of the five adoption factors. Our analysis shows that preferences and resource endowments are the factors most often included in studies. However, adoption behavior is most likely to be significantly influenced by risk, biophysical, and resource factors. In our conclusion, we discuss specific recommendations for the next generation of adoption studies and meta-analyses that include considering a fuller menu of variables, reporting key statistics and marginal probabilities, and conducting weighted meta-regressions.

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Taking stock of agroforestry adoption studies

Despite the great potential of agricultural innovations, the uptake by smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa seems to be slow. We reviewed existing theories and frameworks for the uptake of agricultural innovations and found that these tend to emphasize the role of extrinsic factors such as the characteristics of the adopter and the external environment in the decision-making process. In this paper, we argue that intrinsic factors such as the knowledge, perceptions and attitudes of the potential adopter towards the innovation play a key role, but this has been less studied. We present an analytical framework that combines both extrinsic and intrinsic factors in farmers' decisions to adopt new agricultural technologies and apply the framework to agroforestry adoption as a case study. We review the literature on agroforestry adoption in sub-Saharan Africa and identify the extrinsic and intrinsic variables affecting the uptake of agroforestry technologies. We conclude that the uptake of agricultural tech...

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/14735903.2014.912493

The role of knowledge, attitudes and perceptions in the uptake of agricultural and agroforestry innovations among smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa

Paying for Environmental Services: An Analysis of Participation in Costa Rica’s PSA Program

Assessing farmer use of climate change adaptation practices and impacts on food security and poverty in Pakistan

"Sustainable agriculture" is a concept that is both ambitious and ambiguous. The Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) of the United Nations posits that sustainable agriculture (SA) has five major attributes: it is resource conserving (of land, water, plant, and genetic resources), environmentally non-degrading, technically appropriate, and economically and socially acceptable (FAO). Integrated natural resource management (NRM)-a closely related concept-is conceived by the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research as aimed at jointly improving human livelihoods, agroecosystem resilience, agricultural productivity, and environmental services (CGIAR). Alternative conceptions emphasize profitability and economic feasibility (Kuyvenhoven and Ruben), social equity (Conway), community building and local participation (Chambers), social learning (Pretty and Uphoff), and other dimensions. These various objectives, criteria, and characteristics may or may not be consistent.

Agricultural Sustainability and Technology Adoption: Issues and Policies for Developing Countries

http://directory.umm.ac.id/Data%20Elmu/jurnal/A/Agriculture,%20Ecosystems%20and%20Environment/Vol80.Issue3.Sept2000/1581.pdf

David Mbila

Papers

Econometric analysis of the determinants of adoption of alley farming by farmers in the forest zone of southwest Cameroon