Abstract:
Estimate the economic value of newly discovered agricultural input called ZM-GrowTM
foliar fertilizer is essential for sustainable crop production, correcting soil micronutrient
deficiencies and recycling of valuable resources. At Dangla district, deficiency of
essential soil micronutrient elements is the major problem for agricultural production
and productivity. Specifically, this thesis aimed to estimate smallholder farmers’ mean
willingness to pay and identify factors that affect farm households’ willingness to pay for
ZM-GrowTM foliar fertilizer at Dangla, Amhara, Ethiopia. For this purpose, both primary
and secondary data were used. The primary data were collected from 389 sample
households. For descriptive analysis, both descriptive and inferential statistics were
used. Tobit regression model and seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model were also
employed to estimate the collected data. The result of contingent valuation method
indicated that out of the total sample households, 71.72% of total households were
willing while 28.28% of the households were non-willing to pay for ZM-GrowTM foliar
fertilizer using randomly distributed initial bid prices (100,200,400) ET Birr/lt.
Moreover, the result of the tobit regression model showed that education level of the farm
household, total annual income, access to credit service, access to agricultural extension
service, perception for fertilizer and cost of the existing fertilizer had positive and
significant effect on farm households willingness to pay while age of farm households,
availability of labour shortage and initial bid price had negative and significant effect on
farm households’ willingness to pay for ZM-GrowTM foliar fertilizer. Therefore,
stakeholders should be considered these variables when the fertilizer is applied in the
study area. Correspondingly, the result of seemingly unrelated bivariate probit model
indicated that the mean willingness to pay amount for ZM-GrowTM foliar fertilizer from
closed ended format was 121.16 ET Birr per litre per household. On the other hand, the
descriptive result of mean willingness to pay amount for open ended format was 161.105
ET Birr per liter per farm household. This suggests a good indicator for the concerned
body to try and test the performance of ZM-GrowTM foliar fertilizer at the study area.