Effect of Dairy Cattle Breeders' Association (DCBA) Membership on Sustainability of Innovations in Samsun Province of Turkey

The aim of this research is to analyse the effects of Dairy Cattle Breeders' Association (DCBA) memberships on the sustainability of dairy related innovations in Samsun province of Turkey. Thus, the personal and farm characteristics and information systems of members and non-members of the DCBA were initially compared and the relations between these characteristics and the sustainability of innovations were analysed. Structured interviews were used to collect data from 43 members and 65 non-members of the DCBA by random sampling. The members had higher socio-economic status compared to the non-members in terms of farmers' personal characteristics and farm structure. Some of these factors affected the sustainability of innovations which were measured as the Innovation Sustainability Index (ISI) and calculated by multiplying the number of innovations with their years of adoption. Thus, partial correlation coefficient between ISI and some variables (controlled by the DCBA membership) was calculated. The result showed that the years of formal education, agricultural information score, agricultural income, milk yield, size of feed crops and number of European breeds were positively correlated with ISI. Positive association between ISI and higher socio-economic status emphasizes the importance of DCBA membership in adopting and sustaining innovations.