Effects of social network structure on the diffusion and adoption of agricultural technology: Evidence from rural Ethiopia

Yasuyuki Todo, Petr Matous () and Dagne Mojo
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Petr Matous: Complex Systems Research Group, School of Engineering, University of Sydney

No 1505, Working Papers from Waseda University, Faculty of Political Science and Economics

Abstract: This paper investigates the effects of social network structure on the diffusion of agricultural technologies using household-level panel data from Ethiopia. We correct for possible biases due to the endogeneity of social networks using a social experiment in which we provide mobile phones to randomly selected households. We find that the effect of social networks varies depending on the network structure and characteristics of the technologies considered. The diffusion of information on a simple technology is determined by whether farmers know an agricultural extension agent. However, the diffusion of information on a more complex technology is not promoted by simply knowing an extension agent but by knowing an agent that a particular household can rely on and by clustered networks in which most friends of the household are friends of each other. This finding suggests that knowing and understanding more complex technologies require strong external ties and flows of the same information from multiple sources.

Keywords: knowledge diffusion; technology adoption; agriculture; social network; Ethiopia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 O33 Q16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 37 pages
Date: 2015-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr, nep-dev, nep-ict, nep-net, nep-soc and nep-tid
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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