Low and slow adoption of innovative technologies among smallholder farmers in Tunisia is a key agricultural development problem partly related to the existing technology transfer approach used in the country. The objective of this study is to analyse how to design innovative technology transfer strategies more effective in terms of increasing female and male farmers’ adoption of an improved barley variety, ‘Kounouz’, for small ruminant nutrition. A randomised controlled trial method was used with farmers in Tunisia to implement four extension treatments and to evaluate their effects on adoption of Kounouz. Difference-in-difference estimates showed that intensive agricultural trainings can significantly improve adoption of Kounouz. Technical trainings combined with economic and organisational training and female empowerment courses resulted in a higher adoption rate. This finding has important policy implications, because it suggests that ensuring more widespread and equitable adoption of improved technologies may not require changes in the research system, but rather introduction measures that ensure better access for women to gender-sensitive extension programmes given their positive impacts on technology adoption of the household.

突尼斯小农对创新技术的采用率低且缓慢是一个关键的农业发展问题，部分原因在于该国使用的现有技术转让方法。本研究的目的是分析如何设计更有效的创新技术转让策略，以增加雌性和雄性农民采用改良大麦品种“Kounouz”的小型反刍动物营养。突尼斯的农民使用随机对照试验方法实施四种扩展处理，并评估它们对采用 Kounouz 的影响。差异中的差异估计表明，密集的农业培训可以显着提高 Kounouz 的采用率。技术培训与经济和组织培训以及女性赋权课程相结合，提高了采用率。这一发现具有重要的政策意义，因为它表明，确保更广泛和公平地采用改进的技术可能不需要改变研究系统，而是需要采取措施确保女性更好地获得对性别敏感的扩展计划，因为它们对家庭技术采用。