Admassie, Assefa (Dr.)Tadesse, Beyene2021-07-242023-11-042021-07-242023-11-041998-06http://etd.aau.edu.et/handle/123456789/27338The SG 2000 extension project has been disseminating improved maize technologies, among others, to achieve its objective of improving farm productivity and thereby increasing food grain production. However, the SG 2000 project may not be special to weakness and constraints that the previous extension approaches were faced with. Thus, this thesis has attempted to identify determinants of extension participation, and to evaluate the impact of the SG 2000 extension project on maize production by examining the level of awareness, adoption, and the increment in productivity and profitability attained using the improved maize production in the Bako area. The Probit model and the Two-Stage Switching Regression approach were employed in the analysis using data collected from 225 sample farm households. ~ It has been found out that proximity to the main road, number of oxen owned, total farm size owned, education level of the household head and availability of credit for down payment significantly affected farms decision to participate in the SG 2000 extension activities significantly high number of both the extension participant and non- participant sample farmers have been aware of the improved maize technologies. However, while almost all the sample extension participating farmers adopted the improved maize technologies, only 10% of the sample non-extension participating farmers adopted. The analysis showed that using the improved maize technologies is much more productive as indicated by the higher elasticity coefficients and the marginal products of the inputs. The increment in productivity (gross benefit) resulted from the extension program has been estimated to be 37. 25 quintals of grain maize per hectare. Considering different scenarios of cost for the improved practices the net benefit for the SG ranges from 726.46 to 1267.48 Birr per hectare, and accordingly the MRR ranges from 36% to 213%. On the other hand, the net benefit for the NSG from the traditional practices is only 385.60 Birr per hectare. Nevertheless, many technical and policy problems have been identified affecting the sustainability of the adoption and the incremental productivity of the improved maize technologies. Therefore, the use of the improved maize technologies and the net benefit exhibited by the adopters may be for the short-run and lo may be limited to benefit only few farmers. Thus, the challenge remains with how to accelerate the adoption and maintain the productivity level of the improved maize technologies on a sustainable base. In this regard, subsidizing and facilitating credit services, output price support, encouraging intra-regional trade, improving input supply, promoting the development of infrastructure and encouraging further research to develop streams of improved seeds are suggested.enAgricultural Extension on MaizeExtension Project in Bako AreaThesis