Adoption of cowpea hermetic storage by women in Nigeria, Niger and Burkina Faso

In this study, 2741 randomly selected rural women were interviewed about their cowpea storage practices in 101 villages in Burkina Faso, Niger and Nigeria in late 2010 and early 2011. The overall objective was to determine their cowpea storage practices and identify the most important factors in choosing Purdue Improved Crop Storage (PICS) triple bag storage. About two thirds of women said they used some type of hermetic storage. The hermetic containers included metal drums, plastic jugs, double bags and triple bags. The weighted percentage of women using PICS triple layer bags is 46%. Quantity of cowpea stored by technology showed similar patterns. Overall the percentage of cowpea in hermetic storage was 64%. The study estimated that women stored 50% of their cowpea in PICS bags. The percentage of cowpea in hermetic storage overall and in PICS bags specifically is higher for women than for men in a parallel 2012 ten-country study of mostly male household heads. In PICS villages, the women cite PICS technicians as the most important source of information. In Non-PICS villages, radio was the most important. Most women say that higher income is the major benefit of PICS. The 2009-2010 three country weighted average of the net cash flow from cowpea storage in PICS bags is $10.81/100 kg bag and $39.27 per respondent. Overall, the women indicated that local unavailability was the primary constraint to use of PICS bags. The LOGIT regression analysis shows that the most important factor influencing use of PICS technology is living in a village where PICS demonstrations occurred. The regression shows that radio and the PICS technicians have key roles as information sources. Being able to attend mixed gender meetings was statistically significant only in Burkina Faso where PICS did not organize many women-only PICS activities. (C) 2014 Published by Elsevier Ltd.