Pure farming 2018 potato12/31/2022 Heavy rains also increase the incidence of bacterial wilt and late blight hence resulting into reduced yields. ( 2020) further argues that heat stress on potatoes reduce crop yield especially at the tuber formation stage which is highly sensitive to increasing temperatures. Heat stress due to increased humidity and high temperatures results into drying of seed materials and causes potato plants to produce small, poor quality tubers that fetch very low market prices (Chakraborty & Newton, 2011). Further, increased temperatures due to global warming has led to emergence of new pests and diseases, heat stress on plants and increased cases of late blight and bacterial wilt (Patrick et al., 2020). Reduced precipitation due to prolonged drought has resulted into reduced yields in the previous cropping seasons. This low productivity has been majorly attributed to adverse effects of climate change and variability such as increased severity of pests and diseases, lack of quality seeds and other inputs such as fertilizers, and poor extension services (Gildemacher et al., 2009). Despite being a key crop, farm produce is usually below the potential level at 8–15 T/Ha against a potential production of 40–50 T/Ha (CIP, 2019 Kyamanywa et al., 2011 Ogeto et al., 2019). It doubles up as a major source of income and a staple food. To improve adoption rates, this study recommends increased efforts in exposing farmers to CRPVs through training and increased extensions services. The actual population adoption rate was 6.3% whereas the potential adoption rate was 30.7% revealing an adoption gap of 24.4% due to partial exposure. Results revealed that the main factors affecting adoption were access to information, quality seeds, training, group membership and variations in agro-ecological zones. Focus group discussions and structured questionnaires through household survey were used to collect primary data. Multistage sampling technique was used to sample 384 farmers from Meru County. This study sought to determine true population adoption rates under partial exposure and their determinants using the modern Average Treatment Effect (ATE) framework. More so, standard techniques such as Tobit and Probit models yield biased adoption rate estimates despite existence of vast literature on technology adoption. Despite Climate-Resilient Potato Varieties (CRPVs) having the potential of increasing farmers’ resilience to climate change, previous studies show that uptake of these varieties is still significantly low. L) has been declining over the years in Sub-Saharan Africa due to climate change resulting into low food supply and low income among smallholder farmers.
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