White yam (Dioscorea rotundata) is an important tuber crop in a number of countries, but especially in West Africa where it serves as a food staple as well as a cash crop as excess production is sold in local markets. But the availability of quality planting material, most notably seed yams, for yam production remains an important constraint for farmers. Techniques have been developed to help address this limitation by cutting yam tubers into pieces (minisetts), treating them with the pesticide either via a seed dressing dust or pesticide ‘dips’ and planting to grow seed yams of the required size and quality. But while there have been many studies on the agronomy and adoption by farmers of these techniques, there have been fewer studies on their economic performance. Indeed, to date there have been no studies that compare the economic performance of treating setts compared to leaving them untreated, and neither has there been any analysis of the environmental impact of treating setts. This paper reports the results of a study designed to address these two gaps in knowledge and is based upon results from a series of farmer-managed seed yam plots established in the middle belt of Nigeria over 4 years (2013–2016). Results suggest that revenue and gross margin were higher for treated versus untreated setts although the latter still performed relatively well. Using the Field Use Environmental Impact Quotient (EIQ), the commonly recommended pesticide sett treatments were estimated to have a low-to-moderate environmental impact, and further research is needed to see how far pesticide use can be reduced to still be effective and minimise any environmental impact.

中文翻译：

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Yam Minisett 技术中农药处理的环境和经济影响

白薯（Dioscorea rotundata）是许多国家的重要块茎作物，尤其是在西非，因为过剩的产量在当地市场出售，所以它既是主食又是经济作物。但是，用于山药生产的优质种植材料，尤其是山药种子的可用性仍然是农民的一个重要限制因素。已经开发出一些技术来帮助解决这一限制，方法是将山药块茎切成小块（小块），通过拌种粉或杀虫剂“浸渍”用杀虫剂处理它们，然后种植以种植所需大小和质量的种子山药。但是，尽管对农艺学和农民对这些技术的采用进行了许多研究，但对其经济绩效的研究却很少。确实，迄今为止，还没有研究比较处理雪貂和不处理雪貂的经济表现，也没有任何分析处理雪貂对环境的影响。本文报告了旨在解决这两个知识差距的研究结果，并基于 4 年来（2013-2016 年）在尼日利亚中部建立的一系列农民管理的种子薯类地块的结果。结果表明，治疗组的收入和毛利率高于未治疗组，尽管后者的表现仍然相对较好。使用田间使用环境影响商 (EIQ)，通常推荐的农药沉降处理估计具有中低度环境影响，