By Agwu, Agwu Ekwe
'l'hc s t ~ t c 1 ~\\.,; IS dcsigncd lo csnlninc ihc dil'li~sion oS imp~uvccl coii:pea
pi-urlcrc~iwt c c h n o j ~ ~ i casm ong kf'rlnncrs in 1111;. Nor111 East Savanna Lone of
7 . Nigeria. 1 he Specific ohjec~ives of tiic sli~ily were to: dcscribe h e production
sysrrrnz of cowpca farmers and the miljor cowpea varieties grown in [he area;
dcrcrminc the e ~ l e n t 01' adoption of [he recornmended coivpca recl~nologies;
delc~minc ~ l i c ' i~lllilc~icc:1 (' 1ccl~1~0l~~gy- l .~lv:1;tIcIc,l~ ; ~ ~a!ncds socio-ccono~nic
cllarnc~uistics r?S 11-12 farmers on the adoption of improved co\vpc?a tecl~nologies;
asce.rtain the ralcs ui' a\vr~renc.ssa nd adoption and Icl~geho f innovalion - decision
IWI-iods for 1;lrnm-s adoplill? i111p1,oved co\\:pca tcchnologics, as a measure of the
diffusion of 11me ~echnologics; ascertain [he relalivc irn1301-lance of informarion
sources on I\Y diffusion ol' improved coivpea technolo~iesa nd identify the major
Cacron constraining [he sdoption and dif'fusion of the recommended coivpea
pl-wductian td-rnoIug.ics as perceived by Ihe fi~rniers, Di~ta Ibs [he study wese
zollecred from a randomly selected sample of one hundred and thirty (130)
coit.pea farmers in the NurthEasl Savanna % O ~ C of Nigcria, through the usc or
srnlcm-eb intcwicw schcdulc. lkmctir~tagems txn scores, step-ivise iniiltiple
regression and exploratory faclor analysis procedure were the statistical tools
uscd for data analysis. l'hc findings indicared that the fanners intercroppcd
7 7 ccstt.pc"a ~ \ ~ ci c~rchal s, cspecinlly millet. l h e ina~josi mproved coivpca imieties
nrD\v?.n in thc area were 1'1.A 60, TVx 3236 and I f i Broivn, ivhile "Kanannado', -5
'"Yarcs da K~kari'"a nd "B~gom"w ere rhc major local con1pea \ ,as ides gr-oiiin by the
filrnlc.~sT.h e. adoption of the ~*ecornmendedco wpca technologies was genesally low,