Technology Adoption and Off-Farm Household Income: The Case of Herbicide-Tolerant Soybeans

Abstract

We model the interaction of off-farm work and adoption of agricultural technologies and the impact of adopting these technologies on farm household income from on farm and off-farm sources after controlling for such interaction, and estimate the model for the case of adoption of herbicide-tolerant (HT) soybeans using a nationwide survey of soybean farms for 2000. We find that adoption of HT soybeans is positively and significantly related to off-farm household income for U.S. soybean farmers, after controlling for other factors. In addition, while on-farm household income is not significantly related to adoption, total household income increases significantly with adoption.