Abstract

GUARDIOLA , Jorge  and  JENNIFER, Bernal. Factores influyentes en la adopción de cultivos no tradicionales: El caso de guatemala. Agroalim [online]. 2009, vol.15, n.29, pp.27-37. ISSN 1316-0354.

One of the goals of the developing countries was to promote the crops and consumption of traditional food, in order to preserve the culture of the regions. Nevertheless, in spite of the fact that the traditional food occupy a place favored in the agriculture-food consumption chain in Guatemala, from the decades of the seventies, now the production and marketing of non traditional crops for food takes a major role. The aim of this study is to identify factors that influence the production of non traditional food in the Altiplane of Guatemala. A cross-sectional, descriptive and analytical multivariate research was performed, with a random sample of 379 rural households. We contrast the contribution of educational, economic and food related variables to these crops. A probabilistic analysis was performed in order to determine the contribution of every variable. The results indicate that factors like the family work and the irrigation influence to a great extent into the adoption of non traditional crops. Nevertheless, other reasons like the traditional attitude towards agriculture can provoke that factors such as irrigation were not considered to be beneficial for the adoption of these crops.

Keywords : food production; food consumption; non traditional crops; Guatemala.