Farmers’ attitudes and practices towards variety and certified seed use, seed replacement and seed storage in wheat growing areas of Ethiopia

Farmers’ prevailing attitudes and practices towards wheat variety and certified seed use, seed replacement and seed storage were assessed through a field survey following a multistage purposive sampling technique to identify 552 smallholder farmers from 10 districts (wereda) in three regional states (Oromiya, Amhara, and SNNP) in Ethiopia. Data were collected in 2013, using a structured questionnaire and subject to descriptive analysis and cross-tabulations. About 57.6% (n = 514) of respondents preferred wheat varieties with high yield whereas 39.9% of the respondents preferred varieties with disease resistance. Farmers purchased an average amount of 157.2 kg certified seed in one season, and most of them paid for it in cash, regardless of their attitudes to seed prices. Disease susceptibility of the existing variety was a significant reason why most farmers (63.8%, n = 538) purchased certified seed. Farmers in the studied areas have practised storing own saved seed up to one year. In conclusion, farmers have good knowledge of certified wheat seed, but their attitudes that dictated the frequency of purchase of certified seed have to be addressed adequately through backstopping of the certified seed supply chain with disease resistant varieties but that have minimum yield penalty.