Original Research Article

Outlook on Agriculture
1–11
An innovation systems approach to © The Author(s) 2023

understanding forage adoption intensity in Article reuse guidelines:

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the dairy systems of Kenya and Ethiopia DOI: 10.1177/00307270231171712
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Rosie Morrison1,2 , Nils Teufel3, Alan Duncan2,3

and Andrew Barnes1

Abstract
The adoption of cultivated forages in smallholder dairy systems offers a cost-effective way to increase the productivity of
livestock. The Kenyan and Ethiopian governments have both stated an ambition to increase the use of forages in their
dairy sectors; however, policies have failed to produce widespread results. Existing research tends to focus on local barriers
to forage adoption and not the wider innovation environment. To fill this literature gap, this study uses a Tobit model to
analyse village-level data from Kenya and Ethiopia in 2015. A potentially important relationship between milk buyers and
forage intensity in Ethiopia, which has not previously been addressed in the literature, is identified. As the Ethiopian gov-
ernment dominates the forage sector, the results of this study indicate that private milk buyers may offer an alternative
source of information. In the Kenyan context, this paper finds that informal institutions and farmer-to-farmer information
transmission are important in adoption decisions and should be considered when designing extension strategies.

Keywords
Agricultural innovation systems, Kenya, forage, dairy, Ethiopia, smallholder

Introduction Agricultural innovation systems

Livestock innovations such as improved forages have the
potential to increase dairy yields, resulting in higher income
and better nutrition for smallholders. With food security and
poverty being pressing issues across sub-Saharan Africa
(SSA), the promotion of cultivated forages has been included
in the agricultural development strategies of Kenya and
Ethiopia (Ericksen and Crane, 2018; Turner et al., 2019).
Despite the positive effect of forages on milk yields (Osele
et al., 2018), uptake amongst smallholders has remained low
with the underlying reasons not being fully understood.
Previous studies have provided insights into technology adop-
tion constraints linked to household and technology character-
istics but have not given sufficient attention to the wider
context that enables innovation processes (Kebebe et al.,
2015). Studies that have looked at the wider context note
the importance of building capacity across the whole innov-
ation system and value chain (Ayele et al., 2012).
This study seeks to add to the literature on how wider
contextual and institutional factors affect forage adoption.
To achieve this, an Agricultural Innovation Systems (AIS)
framework is employed which looks at innovation
through a wide lens, capturing the institutional environment
and the actors within it. Village-level data collected from
Kenya and Ethiopia in 2015 is then used to answer the
research question ‘what can the characteristics of villages
in Ethiopia and Kenya tell us about the innovation system
and its impact on dairy technology uptake?’
AIS focus on the collective nature of innovation, emphasis-
ing the importance of co-evolutionary processes that
involve a range of actors, organisations and institutions.
These components of AIS interact and adapt over time, cre-
ating a complex and non-linear innovation process. Within
innovation systems, the enabling environment is where the
rules and norms that govern behaviour and interactions are
set. These include formal and informal institutions. If badly
designed formal institutions can have a negative impact on
innovation. In Kenya, for example, the devolution of dairy
policies to county governments led to policies and regula-
tions being scattered, making it difficult for a single coher-
ent and enforceable approach to dairy development to be
identified (Rademaker et al., 2016). Informal institutions
can be important in governing the use of communal
1
Scotland’s Rural College, SRUC Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
2
Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems, University of
Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK
3
International Livestock Research Institute, Nairobi, Kenya
Corresponding author:
Rosie Morrison, Scotland’s Rural College, SRUC Edinburgh, King’s
Buildings Campus, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JG, UK. Global
Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems, University of Edinburgh, Sir
Alexander Robertson Building, Easter Bush Campus, Edinburgh EH25
9RG, UK.
Email: rosie.morrison@live.co.uk
2 Outlook on Agriculture 0(0)
resources, such as grazing lands for livestock, by creating
rules around their usage (Yami et al., 2011). They can
also lead to the creation of groups such as Iddirs, a form
of informal risk-sharing institutions in Ethiopia. Iddirs
were originally set up to provide mutual aid for funerals
but have since expanded to provide loans for members
when they experience economic shocks.
At the centre of AIS are the organisations, actors and net-
works that directly contribute to the innovation process. This
study focuses on smallholders who are not a homogenous
group and have individual needs, motivations and risk atti-
tudes, which need to be accounted for when designing inno-
vations. Gender must also be considered when assessing the
innovations and the innovation system as female farmers in
SSA make up a significant proportion of the labour force,
yet are marginalised in terms of land ownership, information
access and decision-making rights, amongst other things
(Phiri et al., 2022). For AIS to be effective, they should be
collaborative and allow smallholders to co-design context-
appropriate innovations. This collaboration process can be
facilitated and supported by bridging institutions, such as
extension services and stakeholder platforms, that help to
actively embed smallholders in the wider system.
Innovation in forage and dairy systems
In Ethiopia, public sector actors are heavily involved in the
promotion of forage use and its related services. The govern-
ment provides almost all the extension services which have
been criticised for failing to empower farmers due to a lack
of ‘actionable strategies’ making them unable to respond to
user needs (Gebremedhin et al., 2006; Tefera et al., 2010).
Narrow mandates have also meant the heavily government-
funded research sector has struggled to focus on non-
technical issues, limiting the impact forage research has
had on dairy development (Järnberg et al., 2018; Kebebe
et al., 2015; Tefera et al., 2010). These barriers to innovation
are further exacerbated by the high levels of bureaucracy that
prevent private sector actors entering into the system
(Aranguiz and Creemers, 2019).
The use of cultivated forages within Kenya is generally
higher than Ethiopia, mostly due to a long tradition of
using local Napier grass to feed livestock (Duncan et al.,
2016). However, a lack of livestock feed is still a significant
issue within the dairy sector (Njarui et al., 2021). In Kenya,
the government has supported a liberalised approach to
dairy, leaving many elements of the sector to be dictated
by market forces and non-government actors (Kaitibie
et al., 2010). This has left gaps in the formal infrastructure,
particularly in access to finance, as many private lenders see
smallholders as too high risk. These gaps have led to an
increase in informal institutions such as savings and credit
groups (Wilkes et al., 2019). Some parts of the Kenyan agri-
cultural sector experience, and benefit from, a higher level
of state involvement. For example, formal forage seed
systems are governed by well-developed legal and regula-
tory frameworks (Creemers and Aranguiz, 2019). As a
result, the Kenyan forage seed sector has government
research centres, seed certification schemes and has seen
improvements in seed packaging and production (Creemers
and Aranguiz, 2019). However, due to a large proportion
of planting materials and seeds being exchanged informally
between farmers, the positive effects of forage seed regula-
tions are constrained as they tend to be mostly focused on
large formal organisations (Maina et al., 2022).
Methods
Data collection
This study uses data collected by the International
Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) in Kenya and
Ethiopia in 2015. Village-level data is used as forage adop-
tion often appears to be clustered and therefore adoption
decisions are likely to be affected by contextual factors.
Using household-level data may limit our understanding
of the scale and reasons behind forage adoption.
The villages included in the data collection were selected
based on their location as forage production in both coun-
tries is concentrated in certain domains. In Kenya, counties
were used to identify forage production domains. Counties
are the first administrative unit in the country and typically
account for around 500,000 to 2 million people (Kenyan
Bureau of Statistics, 2019). In Ethiopia, forage production
is far more limited meaning woredas, the third administra-
tive unit, were used to identify forage production
domains. There were 769 woredas registered in Ethiopia
in 2008 (Yilmaz and Venugopal, 2008), with an average
of 108,000 people per woreda (The World Bank, 2022).
The location selection in Kenya began with identifying
general areas of the country where sufficient forage was
grown. Five regions were chosen: Upper Rift, Western,
Nyanza, Central and Coast. The counties within these
regions were then ranked based on their dairy density,
which is a good indicator of forage demand. Various data-
sets were used to determine dairy density and a final list of
12 counties was identified. These were, from West to East,
Homa Bay, Bungoma, Kisii, Kakamega,Nyamira, Trans-Nzoia,
Nandi, Uasin, Nyandarua, Kiambu, Murang’a and Kilifi.
In Ethiopia, four regions were selected based on their
forage production. These were: Oromiya, Southern
Nations, Nationalities and Peoples Region (SNNP),
Amhara and Tigray. Expert knowledge was then used to
select 20 woredas within these regions that were most rele-
vant for forage production. The woredas were, from West to
East in each region, Diga, Sibu Sire, Ejerie, Ada’a,
Walmara, Gerar Jarso and Chrio Zuria in Oromiya; Sodo
Zuria, Bolossa Sore, Dale and Awasa Zuria in SNNP;
Mecha, Bahir Dar Zuria, Yilmana Densa, Fogera, Farta
and Dejan in Amhara and Kilte Awluaelo, Enderta and
Atsbi Wenberta in Tigray. The 20 woredas contained 545
kebeles (peasant associations), the lowest administrative
unit. In Kenya, villages were randomly selected from
each county as group discussions on a greater level would
not have yielded reliable results. In Ethiopia, kebeles were
used as the final selection unit and are also referred to as vil-
lages in this study. According to local experts, kebele
members would be able to provide responses regarding
Morrison et al.
Figure 1. The locations of the data collection sites for this study.
the whole kebele during discussions. To allow for compar-
isons between the different counties and woredas, an equal
number of villages from each location were chosen from
each. In total 360 villages were surveyed, 180 in each
country. The locations of the villages are shown in Figure 1.
In the selected villages, structured questionnaires were
carried out with groups of villagers. When the villages
were contacted to prepare for the group discussions, they
were asked to assemble a group of 5–10 participants who
had good knowledge of the village’s farming matters but
also were diverse in terms of gender, age, farm size and
social status. Groups often included village elders and
respected farmers. Expert facilitation was needed to
ensure that several voices were heard during the workshop.
Due to forage adoption being clustered, gathering village-
level data in this way can provide a more accurate
measure of forage intensity than individual household-level
data. Additional questions on farming practices in the sur-
veyed villages were also asked to provide insights into
major differences in farming systems and therefore ensure
that our measurement of forage intensity was relatively
accurate given the wider farming context.
As the data specifically focuses on forage production
areas within both countries, the results of the analysis
may not be transferrable to the entire country, but it does
allow cross-country comparisons.
Dependent and independent variables
To better understand the determinants of forage adoption,
this study uses a Tobit regression model which is described
in more detail below. The variable ‘forage intensity’ was
created from the survey data to represent adoption and
form the dependent variable in the subsequent statistical ana-
lysis. Forage intensity is the percentage of arable land per
3
village that is dedicated to cultivated forages. Most static
adoption models use binary independent variables that are
categorised into ‘adopters’ or ‘non-adopters’. However,
these models may lead to biased results as the adoption
process does not necessarily have a defined endpoint. The
forage intensity variable falls between 0% and 100% allow-
ing for different levels of adoption to be captured. As the AIS
paradigm emphasises that adoption is a process, it was
important to select a variable that was able to capture this.
Figure 2 shows the distribution of forage intensity for
Kenya and Ethiopia. In both countries, forage intensity is
skewed to the left, with many values gathered around 0%.
Eleven independent variables were selected to be
included in the statistical analysis; these are detailed in
Table 1.
To provide insight into how market-orientated small-
holders are, the variables market integration, access to a
milk collection centre and distance to town centre were
selected. A greater amount of market orientation increases
the likelihood that farmers within the village will have
access to other actors in the AIS. This can result in increased
information sharing and knowledge of new innovations.
The variables dairy intensity, percentage of land tilled by
tractors, average land per household, percentage of house-
holds with a female head and access to informal finance
and village savings were chosen to provide insight into vil-
lages and the informal institutions within them. A key
element of AIS are the bridging institutions that aim to
create links between smallholders and other actors within
the innovation system. Due to the challenges of reaching
rural populations, access to bridging organisations can
differ based on location (Ergano et al., 2010). Access to
extension officers and the number of forage projects in
the village were both used as indications of how effective
bridging organisations in the AIS were.
4 Outlook on Agriculture 0(0)

Figure 2. The frequency of forage intensity rates in the Kenyan and Ethiopian villages included in this study.

Table 1. Descriptions of the independent variables used in the statistical analysis.

Statistics

Kenya Ethiopia
n = 180 n = 180

Category Variable name Explanation Mean SD Mean SD

Bridging Number of The number of projects that are active, or have been active, 0.43 0.74 1.24 0.69
institutions projects within the village
Extension access Does the village have access to dairy, crop and fodder 0.66 1.15 2.43 1.16
extension? (access to each extension type measured with a
dummy variable and then summed together to give a value
of up to 3)
Market Milk collection Does the village have a milk collection centre in it? 26 9
orientation centre (Percentage of villages)
Market integration What proportion of milk produced is sold? 63.7 23.4 32.03 33.84
Distance to town Distance to the nearest town (km) 7.56 12.6 17.04 13.41
Village Percentage tilled What proportion of land is tilled by tractors? 18.73 31.8 0.19 2.26
characteristics tractor
Percentage with a What proportion of farming households have a female head? 15.4 10.68 20.02 14.11
female head
Average land per What is the average amount of cultivated land per household 2.96 5.32 6.47 4.74
household (acres)
Dairy intensity What proportion of total livestock are dairy? 15.28 19.15 2.5 6.65
Village savings Does the village have savings groups? (Percentage of villages) 5 10
Informal finance Are there informal finance options within the village? 70 66
(Percentage of villages)

As well as the independent variables described in Table 1,
regional dummies were included in the Tobit regression
model to account for any differences in agroclimatic condi-
tions. For Ethiopia, the country regions (i.e. SNNP) were
used as dummies as most study sites were clustered close
together within the regions and therefore had similar agrocli-
matic environments. In Kenya, study sites were divided into
western, central or south-eastern regions as these areas have
similar climatic conditions.
Empirical specification
The statistical analysis uses a Tobit regression model to test
which village characteristics affect the dependent variable,
forage intensity. As forage intensity is measured as a percent-
age between 0% and 100%, it cannot fall below 0% which
means that all non-adopters will be censored and will accu-
mulate at this point. With data that is censored, it is appropri-
ate to use a Tobit model as they are designed to estimate
linear relationships between variables when there is either
left or right censoring in the dependent variable. The struc-
tural equation of the Tobit model is shown below:
y∗i =x′i β + εi
where y∗i is the non-observed latent variable, represented by
the dependent variable, fodder intensity. x is the vector of
independent variables hypothesised to influence adoption.
β represents the parameters associated with the independent
Morrison et al. 5

variables. ε is the random disturbance term. yi is the observed
component of the dependent variable.
The observed values for y are defined by:
yi = y∗ if y∗ > τ
yi = τy if y∗ ≤ τ
where the data is censored at τ, in this case at 0.
Separate Tobit regression models were estimated for
Kenya and Ethiopia. As explained above, the differing char-
acteristics and contexts of each country’s innovation system
require us to accommodate these in different models.
Tobit models are dependent on the assumptions of homo-
scedasticity and normality. Therefore, before running the
models the independent variables were checked for the exist-
ence of multicollinearity using the variance inflation factor
(VIF). A VIF value of over 5 can indicate the presence of mul-
ticollinearity. The highest VIF value for Ethiopia was 3.38 and
for Kenya was 2.06, therefore multicollinearity is not a
concern amongst the independent variables. Checks for homo-
scedasticity and normality where also carried out after the
model was estimated and are discussed with the model results.
Results
Descriptive statistics
The villages surveyed contained an average of 175 house-
holds for Kenya and 1156 for Ethiopia. Within these vil-
lages, over 90% of households in both countries
participated in some form of farming activity. A minority
of households in both countries had access to electricity,
only 18% in Kenya and 10% in Ethiopia. In Kenya, 8.7%
of cropland was used to grow forages which made up
34% of the livestock feed. In contrast, only 1.6% of crop-
land in Ethiopia was used to grow forages which made up
only 7% of livestock feed. Correspondingly, the share of
farming households planting forages was higher in Kenya
with 53% of households growing at least one species of
forage, compared to 19% in Ethiopia (Table 2).
Villagers were asked where they obtained the seeds or
planting materials for their cultivated forages. Some forages,
such as Napier, are often shared vegetatively, that is, as
splits, due to challenges of seed production and growing
from seed. Table 3 shows the percentage of seeds and planting
materials acquired from different sources. In Kenya, neigh-
bours and private stockists/vets were the main sources. In con-
trast, in Ethiopia the Ministry of Agriculture dominated the
provision of seeds and planting materials, supplying over 86%.
The types of forage project organisations that are active, or
have previously been active, in the villages surveyed are
shown in the charts in Figure 3. International non-government
organisations are the main implementers of forage projects in
Kenya, whilst in Ethiopia the government runs 80% of projects.
Model results
The results of the Tobit regressions are shown in Tables 4
and 5. To ensure the models met the normality requirements
of a Tobit regression, the residuals of both regressions were
plotted out in density plots. Both plots were skewed left, but
roughly followed a normal distribution and were therefore
determined to meet the normality requirement. To test for
heteroscedasticity, Breusch-Pagan tests were used. The
results show that heteroscedasticity was not a problem
and therefore the data adequately met the criteria for a
Tobit regression. The McFadden Pseudo R2 for the Kenya
Tobit was 0.26 and Ethiopia was 0.27. McFadden stated
that a Pseudo R2 of above 0.2 indicates the model has a
very good fit (McFadden, 1977).
In Kenya, market integration and village savings were
positively associated with forage intensity whilst distance
to the nearest town, the average land per household and
being located in the south-east of Kenya were negatively
associated with forage intensity. In Ethiopia, market inte-
gration was positivity associated with forage intensity and
the presence of a milk collection in a village was negatively
associated with forage intensity.
The marginal effects show that in Kenya an increase of
1% of milk sold to buyers, which represents market integra-
tion, was associated with an increase of forage intensity of

Table 2. Descriptive statistics of study locations based on village-level aggregates.

Kenya n = 180 Ethiopia n = 180

Mean SE Mean SE

No. of households 175 17.16 1156 69.1

% of households that farm 93 1.07 96 0.73
% households with electricity 18 2.11 10 1.39
% of village land used for cultivated fodder 8.7 0.74 1.6 0.37
% of hh planting forages 53 2.36 19 1.63
% of livestock feed that comes from planted fodders 34 1.62 7 0.63
Average yield of milk per local cow per day (L) 0.7 0.06 1.4 0.04
Average yield of milk per cross-bred cow per day (L) 5.36 0.22 3.76 0.2
Average number of months villages experience grazing land shortage 3.19 0.17 7.45 0.14
% of villages
% of villages with access to crop extension officer 23 89
% of villages with access to fodder extension officer 26 89
% of villages with access to dairy extension officer 21 84
6 Outlook on Agriculture 0(0)

Table 3. Proportion of seeds and planting materials that farmer/s 0.06%. An increase in the distance to town by 1 km results
receive from different sources. in 0.06% lower forage intensity and an increase of 1 acre in
Kenya Ethiopia the average amount of cultivated land per household results
in a 0.58% decrease in forage intensity.
% of seeds/ % of seeds/ The marginal effects in Table 5 show that in Ethiopia, a
planting planting 1% increase in market integration is associated with a
Source materials Source materials
0.03% increase in forage intensity.
Neighbours 46.9 MoA 86.6
Agro/vet/stockist 14.4 International NGO 7.7
MoA 8.8 ILRI 1.3 Discussion
Other farmers 8.5 National NGO 0.7
Others 21.4 Others 3.7 Data from the survey shows that both countries are experi-
encing low milk yields and feed shortages. Previous studies

Figure 3. Proportion of forage projects that are run by different organisation types in Kenya and Ethiopia.

Table 4. Tobit model results and their marginal effects for the dependent variable forage intensity in Kenya.

Category Variable Standard error Marginal effects

Bridging institutions Number of projects 0.87 0.14

Extension access 0.59 0.30
Market orientation Milk collection centre 1.76 0.17
Market integration 0.03 0.06*
Distance to town 0.05 −0.06 **
Village characteristics Percentage tilled tractor 0.03 −0.04
Percentage with a female head 0.05 0.02
Average land per household 0.28 −0.58*
Dairy intensity 0.03 0.06
Village savings 2.93 4.92*
Informal finance 1.46 −1.24
Regional dummies Western 1.77 −0.33
South-Eastern 3.24 −7.27**
Central 2.21 8.12
Pseudo R2: 0.26
Left-censored observations: 14
Right-censored observations: 0
Uncensored observations: 166

Note: Significance codes: . p < 0.1, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.
Morrison et al. 7

Table 5. Tobit model results and their marginal effects for the dependent variable forage intensity in Ethiopia.

Category Variable Standard error Marginal effects

Bridging institutions Number of projects 0.59 0.12

Extension access 0.35 0.09
Market orientation Milk collection centre 1.53 −0.86*
Market Integration 0.01 0.03**
Distance to town 0.03 −0.01
Village characteristics Percentage tilled tractor 0.17 −0.07
Percentage with a female head 0.05 0.03
Average land per household 0.23 0.05
Dairy Intensity 0.06 0.04
Milk collection centre 1.53 −0.86
Village savings 1.64 −0.26
Informal finance 1.14 −0.53
Regional dummies Tigray 1.92 −0.84
Amhara 1.13 0.21
Oromiya 1.45 0.42
SNNP 1.12 −0.2
Pseudo R2: 0.27
Left-censored observations: 11
Right-censored observations: 0
Uncensored observations: 169
Note: Significance codes: p < 0.1, *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.

have found that incorporating forage into livestock diets is
one of the most important variables influencing the milk
yield of dairy livestock (Osele et al., 2018) and that milk
yields from cross-bred cows in Kenya and Ethiopia can
go above 10 L/day given the right conditions (King et al.,
2006; Tamiru and Amza, 2017). In the villages surveyed,
average daily milk yields for cross-bred cows were far
below this at around 5 L in Kenya and 4 L in Ethiopia.
Shortages of fodder were experienced, on average, over 3
months a year in Kenya and more than 7 months a year in
Ethiopia. An increase in planted forages can help overcome
this. There is therefore evidence to support the need for
effective forage adoption policies. This discussion section
looks at the different elements of the forage innovation
system and the effects they have on forage adoption. It con-
cludes with how policies can be designed to effectively
promote the uptake of forages in both countries in the
future.
Bridging institutions
Extension services offer an important line of communica-
tion between smallholders and other AIS actors. In recent
years there has been a shift towards farmer-to-farmer exten-
sion where a few farmers are trained and then expected to
educate and train their peers themselves (Kiptot and
Franzel, 2015). This approach to extension is in-line with
the idea that for AIS to be successful, farmers and their
needs must be at the centre. This study does not capture
the effects of these newer extension approaches, instead,
it focuses on access to traditional extension officers.
Access to extension officers was not a determinant of
forage intensity in Kenya. Lower numbers of extension offi-
cers and preferences for alternative extension methods may
explain this. For example, Table 3 shows that over half the
seeds and planting materials for the forages in Kenya come
from farmers or neighbours, suggesting a farmer-to-farmer
extension approach may be effective as farmers already
share information and materials. The reliance of farmers
on their peers for information regarding forages was
acknowledged by Wambugu et al. (2011) who stated that
farmer-to-farmer information transmission is the main
driving force behind forage diffusion in Kenya.
The fact that over 80% of the Ethiopian villages sur-
veyed had access to fodder, dairy and crop extension offi-
cers supports previous claims that Ethiopia has one of the
most extensive agricultural extension systems in the world
(Berhane et al., 2018) with extension workers present in
‘every rural community’ (Berhanu and Poulton, 2014:
207). However, the regression analysis showed that
access to extension officers did not have a significant
impact on forage intensity. This result needs to be inter-
preted with some caution due to the high prevalence of
extension officers and therefore little variation. The exten-
sion system in Ethiopia is dominated by the government,
with the data showing that the Ministry of Agriculture pro-
vided over 80% of forage seeds/planting materials and ran
over 80% of the forage projects. This strong government
presence within the Ethiopian agricultural sector has been
argued to have crowded out other actors (Spielman et al.,
2010) increasing the reliance of farmers in rural locations
on the public extension system. Albore (2018) argued that
these extension services have failed, in part, due to institu-
tional problems. Poor public extension services with limited
alternative information sources may have contributed to the
overall low levels of forage adoption in Ethiopia.
Development projects focused on forage promotion
appeared to have had little effect on forage intensity,
despite results indicating that they had provided a consider-
able share of seeds and planting material in Ethiopia and
8 Outlook on Agriculture 0(0)
international NGOs being the most active type of institution
providing seeds and planting material in Kenya. The clus-
tered nature of forage adoption had been previously
explained by the geographical concentration of individual
development projects.
Market orientation
Distance from town centres is often used as a proxy for
market access, meaning in Kenya lower levels of market
access were associated with lower levels of forage intensity.
This combined with the positive relationship between
market integration and forage intensity indicates that in
Kenyan villages where farmers are more market orientated,
there tends to be more forage adoption.
The milk market in Kenya is governed by both formal
and informal institutions and can bring together AIS
actors to exchange both knowledge and milk. The informal
milk market in Kenya accounts for around 80% of marketed
milk (Blackmore et al., 2022). These markets operate on a
trust-based system in relation to quality and safety
(Blackmore et al., 2022). Information shared at these
markets is likely to be more accepted because strong infor-
mal institutions already exist which reinforce the trust-
worthiness of other market participants. Knowledge of
forage technologies may therefore be exchanged at
markets resulting in higher levels of adoption. There is
also a formal milk market in Kenya where buyers such as
cooperatives and private companies purchase milk from
smallholders if it passes formal safety checks. These types
of buyers often offer smallholders training and access to
inputs which may result in higher forage use. Being more
market orientated also indicates a stronger focus on dairy
production as a business, which may result in farmers
being more willing to invest in forage technologies to
improve their production.
In Ethiopia, market integration also had a positive effect
on forage intensity, whilst the presence of a milk collection
centre in a village had a negative effect. As previously dis-
cussed, the Ethiopian government dominates many of the
bridging institutions via which smallholders receive
farming information. Milk markets may offer smallholders
the ability to interact with AIS actors that are not govern-
ment affiliated and therefore act as an important and alter-
nate information source. For example, formal buyers in
Ethiopia such as private companies have been found to
offer advice, training and credit to directly increase the cap-
abilities of farmers (Vandercasteelen et al., 2021). It is also
likely that, similar to Kenya, farmers who are selling more
of their milk are more likely to invest in their milk produc-
tion as a business, which may include dedicating more
resources to forage production. The negative relationship
between milk collection centres and forage intensity is
counter-intuitive. It may be a result of the cooperatives,
who usually run the collections centres, being a channel
for government information transmission (Chagwiza
et al., 2016), thereby reducing farmers’ exposure to
private buyers and alternative knowledge sources.
Therefore, the relationship between milk buyers and
forage intensity, identified as a novel factor in this study,
should be an area for future research.
Village characteristics
In Kenya, the average amount of cultivated land per house-
hold was negatively associated with forage intensity. This
may be due to villages with greater amounts of cultivated
land focusing more on the large-scale production of cash
crops and therefore smallholders consider the opportunity
cost of forage planting to be too high. The positive effect
of village savings on forage intensity indicates that strong
informal institutions exist within the village which may
facilitate the sharing of trusted information and lead to high
levels of adoption. Smallholders can also use the village
savings to directly invest in forages and planting material.
The proportion of farming households with a female
head was not a significant determinate of forage adoption
in Kenya or Ethiopia. A female head indicates that the
female is the main decision-maker when it comes to new
technology. Previous evidence on whether female house-
hold heads are more likely to adopt innovations is mixed
(Peterman et al., 2010; Lukuyu et al., 2021; Oyetunde-
Usman, 2022; Njuguna-Mungai et al., 2022) with other con-
textual factors often being important. For example, a study
in Malawi found that women were less likely to adopt seeds
than men due them having less access to inputs, whereas in
Zambia women had similar adoption levels to men as they
benefitted from the commercialisation of farming (Djurfeldt
et al., 2019). Whilst this study has tried to capture some of
the contextual and institutional factors that affect forage adop-
tion, it is far from comprehensive and does not specifically
consider the interactions between these factors and gender.
The use of village-level data in this study also limits our under-
standing of household-level dynamics which are important in
understanding the role of gender. Further research is therefore
needed to explore the relationship between gender and forage
intensity in more depth and to understand how context affects
the agency and ability of women to make adoption decisions.
Dummy variables to account for different agroclimatic
zones were included in the regression analysis. These
were not significant in Ethiopia, which indicates that
forage adoption is low across the entire country and no spe-
cific regions have higher, or lower, levels. In Kenya
however, the south-eastern region, which is made up of
coastal lowlands, was negatively associated with forage
intensity. Lower levels of forage adoption in this region
have also been identified in previous studies (Njarui et al.,
2016, 2017) and have been attributed to the larger areas
of natural pastures in the region which farmers graze their
livestock on.
Whilst this study is limited in the number of variables it
could include and therefore does not consider every village
characteristic, the absence of any relationship between the
village characteristics and forage intensity in Ethiopia indi-
cates that broader institutional factors may be more import-
ant. In line with previous discussions on the dominant role
of the Ethiopian government, it may be that a lack of plur-
alism and the overbearing presence of a few public
Morrison et al.
institutions are having a greater effect on forage adoption
than village characteristics.
Conclusion
This study finds that in Kenya, market integration has a
positive effect on forage intensity, whilst distance to town
has a negative effect. Both these relationships indicate
that farmers who are more market orientated are likely to
have higher levels of forage intensity. Farmers are likely
to exchange knowledge and resources at markets, which
may have led to increases in forage adoption. This argument
is supported by the evidence that a high proportion of forage
materials are exchanged between peers. The positive rela-
tionship between village savings and forage intensity
further confirms the importance of informal institutions
and social interactions in adoption decisions.
This study also finds that villages located on the south-
eastern coast of Kenya were less likely to adopt forages,
as were villages with more average land cultivated per
household. These relationships are likely due to there
being more space for grazing livestock in south-east
Kenya and a greater focus on cash crop production in vil-
lages with more cultivated land per household.
In Ethiopia, the positive effect of market integration on
forage intensity suggests a previously unexplored relation-
ship exists between milk buyers and forage adoption which
should be a focus for future research. Private buyers may
be offering an important alternative information channel for
farmers. In a similar vein, the negative relationship
between the presence of a milk collection centre and forage
intensity may be a result of farmers who do not have
access to a milk collection centre having to sell to markets
and to private buyers. These findings raise questions about
the effectiveness of the government’s approach to forage pro-
motion. Evidence in this study shows strong state involve-
ment in forage projects, extension services and the
provision of seeds and planting materials, yet the Ethiopian
villages have lower levels of forage adoption and milk
yields when compared to their Kenyan counterparts.
Whilst further research needs to be carried out to better
understand some of the relationships identified in this
study, and to further investigate the impact of the role of
gender on forage adoption, some high-level policy conclu-
sions can be drawn.
• AIS should be pluralistic to ensure smallholders have
access to multiple sources of information. Strong
bridging institutions need to exist which link small-
holders to other actors and which also facilitate dis-
cussions and co-learning as opposed to linear,
one-way information transfers.
• Farmers themselves should also be encouraged to
share information and knowledge with their peers;
this can be done through the creation of more
farmer-to-farmer extension projects or through
farmer groups.
9
Whilst these current results directly apply to Kenya and
Ethiopia, these policy conclusions are important in facilitat-
ing effective information transfer and innovation design in
AIS and therefore can be applied to forage production
areas across East Africa and SSA.
Limitations
The data for this research was gathered in 2015, before the
COVID-19 pandemic. In the years since the data collection,
it is possible that forage systems have progressed in both
countries and this should be considered when interpreting
the results of this study. The methods used to collect
village-level data may not be entirely accurate as they rely
on farmers recall and knowledge. Whilst we believe the
accuracy of data gathered in this way is acceptable to
draw conclusions from, it should be noted that there is
scope for error. In future, multiple focus groups for each
village could be carried out to reduce inaccuracies further.
This study is also limited in terms of its scope. The
nature of AIS means that many actors, institutions and con-
textual factors are involved in innovation. This study does
not consider all the actors and variables, but instead high-
lights some interesting relationships which are areas for
future research. Finally, the use of the continuous variable
forage intensity allowed a Tobit model to be estimated for
the data. One of the main drawbacks of this approach is
that the model jointly estimates the probability and intensity
of adoption which means the same set of variables explain
farmers’ decisions to adopt, which is a binary, and the inten-
sity of adoption. This may be misleading as these decisions
may not be joint (Danso-Abbeam et al., 2019). Further
research may want to explicitly separate these decisions
and look at the determinants of each.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank the farmers and villager who took part in
this research. For the purpose of open access, the author has
applied a CC BY public copyright licence to any Author
Accepted Manuscript version arising from this submission.
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect
to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
This work was supported through a scholarship to Rosie Morrison
by Scotland’s Rural College and the University of Edinburgh’s
Global Academy of Agriculture and Food Systems. The work
was also supported by the CGIAR Initiative on Sustainable
Animal Productivity (SAPLING) and is supported by contributors
to the CGIAR Trust Fund.
ORCID iD
Rosie Morrison https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9511-1074
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