Does Awareness influence Adoption of agricultural technologies? The case of Improved Sweet potato varieties in Ghana

The Government of Ghana together with donor agencies has in many years paid attention to the agricultural sector with special emphasis on staple crops especially root and tuber crops. Sweetpotato has particularly received a lot of research funding over many years to develop many varieties which have been disseminated. However, many farmers still depend on traditional varieties. The aim of the study was to determine the role of awareness in adoption of improved sweetpotato varieties. By using a cross- sectional data collected from 526 farmers and employing binary logit model, an analysis of factors influencing adoption of improved sweetpotato varieties adoption was evaluated. The results revealed that sixty five percent of farmers had adopted improved sweetpotato varieties. Eighty five percent of farmers were aware of the improved sweetpotato varieties. Empirical results revealed that apart from the standard farm and farmer characteristics and institutional factors that influenced adoption, awareness positively and significantly influenced adoption of improved sweetpotato varieties. Awareness creation and education of the improved varieties will encourage adoption. Government and donor agencies should support the extension services in terms of resources to conduct more demonstrations to create awareness. Furthermore media could be engaged to support dissemination of improved varieties