Integrated pest management (IPM) adoption processes of banana producers in Somalia

Banana is a soft fruit that grows in the equatorial and subtropical regions. Bananas originated in Southeast Asia and are distributed from the Eastern part of India to Northern Australia. After wheat and rice, bananas is the world's fourth most important food. Bananas grow on an area of about 8.8 million hectares of the Earth's land. World banana production increased by 1.2 percent in 2018 to about 116 million tons. Banana cultivation is one of the important crops for Somalia. In 1990, Somalia's banana exports reached their highest level .Today, various agricultural approaches are used around the world to combat diseases and pests that affect banana production. Diseases and pests affecting banana production cause a decrease in yields, which has a negative impact on the livelihoods of hundreds of banana producers in Afgoye. Afgoye is the capital of the lower Shabelle region of Somalia. The aim of this research is to investigate the socio-economic characteristics and agricultural knowledge of farmers who apply and do not apply the Integrated Pest Method (EZY) in Somalia (South West Lower Shabelle region). The sample of the study was selected from banana famers living in Lower Shabelle. As a sampling method, a simple random sampling method was preferred. Interviews were conducted with 200 farmers selected by this sampling method in the 2021 production season, face-to-face and through the Google form, and the data of the study were collected. The data of the study were analyzed on the SPSS 23 program. since there are categorical variables, Chi-Square test was used for relationship analysis. The statistical significance was measured at the level of 0.05.