Rural women's perceptions of the diffusion of technological innovations that increase quality shea butter production in Mali

Abstract

An ethnographic case study was conducted in three villages in Mali (West Africa) to determine the perceptions of woman producers of shea butter toward the introduction of new technologies to save labor input in processing and improving quality of shea butter. During the in-depth interviews conducted, most of the participants said they would be grateful for the technologies, but are facing economic and external market information constraints. A few of the participants still believe that manual churning provides good quality even though it is labor intensive. Participants prefer using visual aids in farmer-to-farmer training because they believe this will be more effective and the knowledge gained will be sustainable.