Factors Affecting Wheat Farmers Willingness to Pay for Agricultural Education Extension Services in Ilam, Iran

To encourage farmers contribution in extension training expenses requires special treatment. This article dealing with factors affecting wheat farmers willing to pay for agriculture extension services in Ilam Province. The statistical population consisted of 57,262 wheat farmers, out of which 381 farmers were selected as research sample through stratified random sampling method according to the Morgan table. Data collection tool was a researcher-designed questionnaire. Face and content validity of the questionnaire were confirmed by a panel of agriculture extension and education experts at Ilam Islamic Azad University. The construct validity was also confirmed by two-criterion convergent validity (AVE=0.79, CR = 0.85). Reliability of the questionnaire was estimated by ordinal alpha coefficient (α=0.84). Logistic regression model applied through Eviews8 software. It was found that, only 28.08% of respondents expressed their willingness to pay for agriculture extension services. According to the regression estimation, factors influencing wheat growers’ willingness to pay for agriculture extension services in Ilam, included farmers’ educational background, income from non-agricultural sources, wheat cultivation area, experience in wheat growing, satisfaction with extension services, and willingness to use extension services. Except the factor ‘having income from non-agricultural sources, all other factors had positive impact on wheat growers’ willingness.