Yam () is an important tuber crop in Nigeria, where it is produced mainly as a source of food crop especially carbohydrate. The current annual production is estimated at 26.587 million metric tons (FAO, 2005). In 1997 alone, Nigeria accounted for 75% of the world production (Manyong 2001. Although yam production in Nigeria is quite high there is still need for increased production to satisfy domestic and possibly export demand (Asumugha 2004). However, production of yam is highly expensive when compared with other root and tuber crops. This is due to costly input requirements, especially labor and planting materials (Ezeh, 1998). For both seed yam and ware yam production, planting materials may exceed 50% of production cost (Orkwor 1998.) A large quantity of edible yam up to 30% of the previous year's harvest may be used to plant a new crop (Okoli and Akoroda, 1995). This makes seed yams account for the high cost of total production cost.The minisett technique involves the use of 25g of setts to produce whole tubers which serve as "seed" yam (Okoli and Akoroda, 1995). This technology was developed to address the problem of high cost of seed yam. Yam minisett technology is a package comprising of the following field operations (i)Land preparation (ii)use of minisett dust( iii) time of planting-when rains become stable( iv)sett size of 25g (v)seed bed preparation( vi)spacing of 25cm x1.0m( vii)use of fertilizer (Iwueke,1991). The rate of adoption of the minsett technique was l o w ( , I w u e k e , 1 9 9 1 ) T h e a d o p t i o n r a t e w a s r e p o r t e d a s l o w a s 4 0 % ( C h i k w e n d u e t al.1994,Ogbodu,1995Anuebunwa et al 1998 This was partly because seed yams vary with ecological zones and farming systems in Nigeria (Asumugha and Eluagu,1999).The study therefore addresses the following
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