ABSTRACT:

The study assesses the extent of adoption of improved cowpea technologies by farmers in Gombe State, Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling procedure were used to select 606 respondents in the study. Data were collected through questionnaire and analysed using descriptive statistics. The revealed that majority of the respondents were male (81.2%) and 65.3% were married, with an average age of 36 years. Majority (66.3%) of the respondents had a household size of 8, majority of the respondents had formal education, 63.9% of the respondents’ main occupation was farming with an average farming experience of 13 years. Less than half (42.9%) of the respondents had farm size of 3ha, 53% of the respondents were not members of any cooperative society and 54.5% had access to informal sources of credit. Majority (87.3%) of the respondents had contact with extension agents. The results on level of farmers’ awareness on improved cowpea technologies reveal that, majority, (74.1%) of the respondents were aware of improved varieties, appropriate storage methods (64.4%), recommended planting date for improved cowpea variety (61.7%), while 59.70% of the respondents were not aware of appropriate seeds rate. Result of the extent of adoption revealed that almost half (45.5%) of the respondents adopted 7-9 technologies which were rated as high, 34.4% of the respondents adopted 4-6 technologies rated as medium, and 20.1% adopted 1-3 technologies rated as low. The study concluded that almost half of the respondents adopted 7 to 9 improved cowpea production technologies; improved seeds, herbicide, pesticide, recommended seed treatment, planting date, and spacing, storage, and fertilizer application. The study recommended that Gombe State Agricultural Development Program (GSADP) should monitor the adoption of improved cowpea production technologies by collecting data on the adoption rates, yields, income changes, and other relevant indicators to assess their extension efforts. This feedback will help fine-tune extension strategies and address any challenges faced by farmers.