Variety Awareness, Nutrition Knowledge and Adoption of Nutritionally Enhanced Crop Varieties: Evidence from Kenya

Abstract This paper uses the Average Treatment Effect framework to determine population potential adoption rates of KK 15 beans when awareness of the variety and knowledge of nutrition attributes is not a constraint. The KK 15 bean is a new variety that contains high levels of zinc and iron, and thus important in the fight against micro-nutrient deficiency in Kenya. The results show that actual population adoption rates of KK 15 beans was 21 percent for the variety aware group, and 31 percent for nutrition attribute knowledge aware group. After controlling for heterogeneous information exposure, the results show that the potential population adoption rates of KK 15 beans would have been 28 percent for variety awareness unconstrained, and 38 percent for nutrition knowledge unconstrained. Coefficients of the ATE model to determine factors influencing adoption are bigger than classical models, implying that the classical model under-estimates the effects. The adoption gap resulting from KK15 variety awareness exposure is 9 percent, and 6 percent for nutrition attribute knowledge. Policies aimed at improving adoption of bio fortified crops need to focus on improving access to information on the varieties and their nutrition attributes through nutrition sensitive extension services. Acknowledgement : THe authors of this paper akcnowledge the Germany Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture for sponsoring this study through the Agriculture and Diet Diversity in Africa (ADDA) Project