Measuring Agricultural Knowledge and Adoption

Understanding the trade-offs in
improving the precision of agricultural measures through
survey design is crucial. Yet, standard indicators used to
determine program effectiveness may be flawed and at a
differential rate for men and women. The authors use a
household survey from Mozambique to estimate the measurement
error from male and female self-reports of their adoption
and knowledge of three practices: intercropping, mulching,
and strip tillage. Despite clear differences in human and
physical capital, there are no obvious differences in the
knowledge, adoption, and error in self-reporting between men
and women. Having received training unanimously lowers
knowledge misreports and increases adoption misreports.
Other determinants of reporting error differ by gender.
Misreporting is positively associated with a greater number
of plots for men. Recall decay on measures of knowledge
appears prominent among men but not women. Findings from
regression and cost-effectiveness analyses always favor the
collection of objective measures of knowledge. Given the
lowest rate of accuracy for adoption was around 80 percent,
costlier objective adoption measures are recommended for a
subsample in regions with heterogeneous farm sizes.