Can Video-Based Training Increase Livestock Farmers' Willingness to Use a Digital Market Information Platform: Experimental Evidence from Nigeria

This study involves an experiment with livestock farmers to evaluate their willingness to adopt and pay for a digital agricultural advisory platform. This agricultural platform is one that provides market information to farmers, to be created by the government, and requires farmers to pay a token to be onboarded on the platform. Despite the many advantages, preliminary evidence and anecdotes show that only about a third of the farmers are willing to take up this technology once the government rolls it out. Therefore, this study aims to identify a low-cost intervention strategy that can enhance farmers' buy-in and increase their understanding of how technology can enhance their operations. This paper, in particular, provides evidence on the effectiveness of video interventions aimed at increasing positive technology awareness and preparedness among farmers in a specific farming community in Nigeria. In the control group, participants watched an unrelated agricultural video, while the treatment group received a specific and detailed narrative about the platform. For example, the script's main message is that digital technology can revolutionize livestock farming by providing farmers with valuable information and tools to improve their operations, increase efficiency, and boost income. The script highlights how digital apps can help farmers with tasks such as monitoring livestock health, tracking production data, and finding buyers for their products. It also features success stories of farmers who have benefitted from using similar technologies. In September 2024, we recruited about 600 farmers and randomly assigned them to one of the two groups during on-site sessions. We confirmed that the farmers in the control and treatment groups were similar, then examined how the treatment affected various outcome variables one week later. These variables included: (i) willingness to adopt (whether the respondent is willing to subscribe to the platform, even if it is a digital platform); (ii) willingness to pay for the subscription, which we elicited using a bidding game; (iii) beliefs about the impact of technology on improving efficiency for small businesses, including small-scale livestock farmers; and (iv) trust in the efficacy of technology in improving livestock farming outcomes. To prevent the experimenter demand effect or social desirability bias from influencing our results, we conducted a list experiment. In other words, we asked farmers to mark all the factors they could consider when making important decisions about their livestock farming practices. We presented three options: consulting with cooperative members or fellow farmers, speaking with family members, or making decisions independently and trusting in the outcome. We only randomly varied the option of searching for information online using available technology. Overall, the initial findings indicate that the intervention was successful in altering farmers' perspectives and increasing their chances of embracing the technology, even if it means paying more for onboarding. These results are robust and persistent even after two weeks of exposure to the treatment. We conducted a heterogeneous analysis and confirmed that the treatment only affects less experienced farmers, female farmers, and those with multiple livestock farms.