Evaluating Knowledge intensification for improved agriculture production in Edo State-Nigeria

The specter of declining food production has long been associated with agriculture in Nigeria, and the disturbing recent report of world Food Security Index, 2019 which ranked Nigeria 96th out of 113countries of the world. The challenge of accelerating growth in agricultural production in Niger-Delta started from uncoordinated land use and the failure to give proper attention to the socio-economics consequences of agricultural intensification. The development of agriculture in the global world today emphasizes knowledge-intensity; therefore, the agricultural practice change in the developing world will have to be re-organized to take advantage of emerging technology to achieve diverse goals of food availability and job creation. The objective of the studies was to evaluate the land use and land cover of Edo State and to determine the level of farmers’ adoption of Space Science and Technology in agricultural practices in Edo State. The LandSat8 sensor of 2024 Satellite image obtained September the same year was used (with a map projection of UTM_ zone 32N, and datum WGS_ 84) to evaluate change detection in the State. Investigation of eighteen local council’s areas of the State was carried out, with 100 farmers /respondents in each Local councils in 2023. A total of 1800 farmers were contacted. Research questions were distributed through the extension officers’ resident in each of the local council areas. The results shows 14.22% is farm land, 19. 20% is a built-up area, 9.65% is a-bare land, 10.55% is plantation, 19.45% is light vegetation, while 16.92% is dense vegetation, and 13.79% is a water body. Additionally, the results 41.00 % of farmers are aware of space technology, and 34.00 partially adopt the technology, with no farmers adopting the complete space technology, and 25 % of farmers are unaware of the technology. Agricultural intensification without adequate knowledge intensification will lead to a decline in the productive capacity of soil in the long run.