Pre-extension Demonstration of Soil Test Crop Response Based Recommended Phosphorus Fertilizer Rate for Tef in Burka Jiren Watershed of Gechi District, Oromia

The pre-extension demonstration trial was conducted during the 2024 main rainy season in Burka Jiren Community Watershed of Gechi District, Buno Bedele Zone. The objectives were to evaluate grain yield, economic profitability and collect farmers’ feedback. The study evaluated soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation against blanket recommendation for tef (Dursi variety) across three demonstration sites. Data were collected on yield, cost incurred, profit gained, and farmers’ feedback. The analysis involved descriptive statistics, independent t-test, and benefit-cost ratio. The descriptive analysis result revealed that, the mean grain yield of 15.1 and 9.9 qt ha⁻¹ were obtained from soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation and blanket recommendation for tef respectively. There was statistically significant mean grain yield difference at (P<.05) between soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation and blanket recommendation for tef with 69.7% yield advantage. Soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation for tef was also favored by the farmers due to having a number of productive tillers per plant, plant height (biomass), spike length, seed quality and higher grain yield compared to blanket recommendation for tef. Likewise, higher net benefit of 136,884 ETB ha⁻¹ was obtained from soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation for tef with benefit-cost ratio of 3.1 compared to blanket recommendation. This implies, farmers can recover all the incurred costs and gain an additional 3.1 ETB for every 1 ETB they invest when using soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation for tef. The overall result showed that soil test crop response based fertilizer recommendation for tef had a significant yield advantage, net benefit, and were favored by farmers, leading to the recommendation for scaling up this technology in similar agro-ecologies.