An empirical investigation on factors affecting coconut growers in the Kurunegala district to adopt integrated pest management techniques

Abstract

The Coconut Development Office Divisions in the Kurunegala district were in the process of introducingIntegrated Pest Management (lPM) techniques to the coconut growers in order to control the majorpest and disease outbreaks of coconut plantations in the district. This study assesses the factorsaffecting these coconut growers to be innovative in adopting these IPM techniques in the cultivation.

The Choice Model used in consumer economics (McFadden 1974) was used as the theoretical baseto explain this behaviour. There were] 27 coconut growers belong to four regions, namelyDarnbadeniya, Kudagalgamuwa, Weerambugedara, and Wellawa who had received a formal educationon the use of IPM techniques in this respect from an Extension Officerls attached to the CoconutCultivation Board were selected to collect data during the April to June in 2005. The Ordered LogisticRegression techniques were used to estimate the coefficients of empirical model, in which fivedependentvariables were developed to reflect the time taken by each grower to adopt at least twoIPM techniques in the cultivation effectively, where the "least" and "most" time takers were namedas "innovators" and "laggards", respectively. The results based on Logits and Marginal Probabilitiessuggest that factors such as age, education, income, and time commitment to the land had a significantand relatively higher impact on grower to be an "innovator". It also revealed that land size, availabilityof credit and skilled labor have no significant impact 011 this behaviour.