Maize farmers’ preferred option for Fall Armyworm control, and factors influencing their preference: A case of Northern Ghana

This study examined maize farmers’ preferred option for control of FAW and factors influencing their preferences in three selected districts of the Northern and North-East Regions of Ghana. Primary data was collected from 323 randomly surveyed maize farmers with the help of well-structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, Henry Garrett ranking test, Wilcoxon signed rank test and multinomial logistic regression were computed to analyze the data. The results revealed that synthetic pesticides use is the most preferred FAW control method whiles Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is the least preferred method among maize farmers in the study area. Results from the Wilcoxon signed rank test showed that farmers’ choice of synthetic pesticide is significantly different from the other FAW control methods. Evidence from the multinomial regression analysis revealed that the preference of maize farmers was influenced primarily by the perceived effectiveness of the control methods, the farmers’ primary occupation, the benefits they receive from belonging to FBOs, and the frequency of their meetings with agricultural extension agents. From the study, synthetic pesticides currently represent the most preferred FAW control method. The study recommends that all synthetic pesticides registered and approved for the control of FAW display graphical labels of the FAW so that all farmers can relate to them and easily recognize the usage of such chemicals. In addition, method and result demonstrations should be adopted to demonstrate the effectiveness of new and alternative methods of FAW control in order to improve adoption of such FAW control methods.