**1. Introduction**

Food security of Bangladesh largely depends on rice production. Rice plays the leading role in all crops by contributing 92% of the total food grain production [1]. Moreover, the country's agro-climatic conditions are perfect for cultivating rice all year [2]. However, the national average rice yield (2.60 t/ha) is much lower than the potential national yield (5.40 t/ha) and compared to other rice-growing countries [3]. A gap, ranging from 1 to 3 t/ha, still exists in between yields currently obtained by farmers and what could be achieved with improved management practices [4]. Apart from this, the population of Bangladesh is currently 162.7 million and projected to be 189.85 million by the year 2030, and thus it would require about 42.50 mt of rice [5]. In addition, the rate of population growth and the level of rice consumption are still relatively high. Simultaneously, ricegrowing land needs to be share for cultivating new crops. Therefore, the current rice yield of 2.74 t/ha needs to be increased to 3.74 t/ha [6], to keep the production of rice in line with the growing population of the country.

Hassan, S.; Kamarulzaman, N.H.; Rahman, M.Z.; Haque, A.N.A. Contribution of Selected Factors on Farmers' Work Performance towards Fertilizer Application in Rice of Bangladesh. *Sustainability* **2021**, *13*, 10795. https://doi.org/10.3390/ su131910795

**Citation:** Bagum, T.; Uddin, M.K.;

Academic Editor: Michael Blakeney

Received: 15 July 2021 Accepted: 18 September 2021 Published: 28 September 2021

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**Copyright:** © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

Balanced fertilization is the key factor in enhancing the production of rice. Fertilizers have the quick capacity to restore depleted soil nutrients, improve soil fertility, and increase the yield of rice [7,8]. Moreover, with appropriate fertilizer management, farmers can potentially increase rice yields [9,10]. The results of long-term experiments also showed that fertilizers can increase output by 40–60% in grain production [11]. Therefore, timely application of fertilizer at the recommended rate is essential for improving rice yield.

However, the current level of applying fertilizer is significantly lower than the recommended levels for almost all food crops. Farmers have resorted to using imbalanced fertilization that does not match nutrient requirements and soil fertility rates [12]. About 51% of farmers applied fertilizer as recommended and the rest were less than the recommended rate [13]. As a result, a substantial gap still exists between the actual and recommended rate of all major fertilizers that are applied in rice cultivation at the farm level [2]. This gap between the recommended rate and the actual amount of fertilizer application is found much higher for TSP and MP than for urea. Farmers' application of fertilizer widely varies from the recommended doses as suggested by the Soil Resource and Development Institute (SRDI) and Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) [2]. Farmers are habituated to apply imbalanced fertilizers that cannot meet the demand for soil nutrients and rice yield [12]. It implies that farmers' work performance to apply fertilizer is insufficient with the requirement of crops. Therefore, there is a gap between the actual rate and the recommended rate of fertilizer [2,14].

Individuals' performance towards efficient use of fertilizer can close the gap between actual and potential outputs [15]. Peoples' work performance is highly influenced by their ability to use knowledge and skills for a required task [16]. Therefore, farmers' work performance signifies their ability to carry out farm activities that lead to higher production [17]. Rice yields can be increased with the help of the timely applying of fertilizer. Hence, farmers need to apply the recommended dose of fertilizer at the proper time and using the appropriate method for sustainable production [18].

Besides, a wide range of factors such as farmers' demographical, psychological, and economic characteristics influence their performance behavior regarding agricultural practices [19]. Moreover, work performance is linked to the factors such as knowledge, skills, abilities, motivation, and personality traits [20,21]. In addition, identifying the highest contributing factors can facilitate the implication of the study findings in an efficient way. Previous researchers [15,17,22] also found the highest contributing factors on respondents' work performance and recommended guidelines for identifying areas that needed to be intensified for improved work performance of people concerned. Therefore, it is crucial to explore the factors that influence strengthening the work performance of farmers towards fertilizer application.

Several studies were conducted in Bangladesh on fertilizer issues [2,23]; however, research is very rare to study how various factors impact farmers' work performance towards fertilizer application in rice. Given this lack of research, this study, therefore, formulated the following objectives:


The current study makes a unique contribution to the existing literature by providing a comprehensive analysis of the factors influencing the work performance of farmers towards fertilizer application in rice in Bangladesh.

The remaining sections of this paper are organized as follows: Section 2 reviews the existing literature on factors that influence farmers' work performance while Section 3 describes the methodology. Section 4 explains the results and discussion. Finally, the conclusions are presented in Section 5.

#### **2. Review of Literature**

Fertilizer is a kind of production input whose demand cannot be circumvented to obtain maximum yield and ensure sustainable crop production. Despite there were many empirical studies conducted nationally and internationally on the importance of using fertilizer for crop production, very few studies focused on farmers' work performance, especially on fertilizer application in rice.

Work performance is regarded as one of the most important dependent variables in several studies [24]. In general, work performance refers to an individual's quantifiable behaviors and outcomes that contribute to a specific goal [25]. Ufuophu-Biri and Iwu [26] described work performance as an instrument used to propel productivity while factors like motivation and skill serve as the processes of attaining productivity. According to Armstrong and Taylor [27], performance is the behavior that achieves results. Individual performance is a key variable in organizational behavior studies. In this study, the farmers' work performance is measured based on their objectives and the actual activities to achieve higher production.

Several interventions such as training, goal setting, feedback, incentives, and supervision may enhance work performance by improving individuals' knowledge, skill, and motivation [28]. Individuals' knowledge and attitude are treated as important determinants of performance [21,29]. In addition, adequate motivation is a crucial factor for higher performance [30]. Concerning the technological characteristics, the factor like perceived ease of use of technology is an important determinant for work performance [31]. Moreover, the quality of work performance is also related to specifications to fit when a person works. Knowledge, abilities, motivation, and other attributes are defined as specifications of work requirement [20].

#### *2.1. Research Gap*

Prior studies have identified a number of factors that might influence the performance of the concerned respondents. A brief list of empirical studies on respondents' performance has been mentioned in the following Table 1.


**Table 1.** List of empirical studies on respondents' performance.

Table 1 summarizes personality traits, individual's skill, organizational commitment, job involvement, motivation, knowledge, job satisfaction, farm management practices, socio-economic characteristics of the respondents as the predictors of individuals' work performance. However, prior studies did not consider farmers' cognitive (i.e., knowledge) and affective (i.e., attitude and motivation) responses and technological characteristics (i.e., ease of use) in a single study rather examined their roles in separate studies, especially in the context of farmers. Therefore, the combined effect of those determinants was quite unknown. Nonetheless, farmers' knowledge, attitude, ease of use of technology, and motivation are crucial factors that need emphasis for the application agricultural technologies by the farming community. Farmers' knowledge and attitude are essential for assessing their technology using behavior [35]. Motivation plays a vital factor in the decision-making process at the farm level [36], while perceived attributes of certain practices such as being easy to apply had the greatest influence on their technology application decisions [37]. Moreover, in the context of Bangladesh, the influences of knowledge, attitude, ease of use of technology, and motivation of farmers on their work performance regarding fertilizer application have not been study before. Therefore, to fulfill this research gap, the researcher selected knowledge, attitude, ease of use of technology, and motivation as influential factors for determining farmers' work performance towards fertilizer application in rice.

#### *2.2. Development of Hypotheses*

The efficiency of knowledge in any process positively affects the individuals' performance [38]. Concerning farm management, agricultural knowledge is the main asset for farmers. With good knowledge, farmers would know what information they need, who to look for, and what to do in their tasks [39]. Empirical research executed by Chi et al. [40] on the effect of knowledge on performance showed that effective management of knowledge positively and significantly affected overall performance. Elsewhere, Masa'deh et al. [41] mentioned that knowledge is the enabler of firm performance. All these results extend the current understanding of knowledge as a predictor of performance. Based on the above discussion the following hypothesis has been developed:

**Hypothesis 1 (H1).** *Knowledge has a significant contribution to farmers' work performance towards fertilizer application in rice.*

Peoples' attitude towards certain objects or technology determines their behavioral intention and actual behavior performance [42]. Attitudes can be a strong predictor of behavior, i.e., performance [43]. Peoples' positive attitude influences their decision to adopt certain practices for their farming [44]. Moreover, the University of Minnesota Libraries Publishing [45] illustrates attitudes towards work as one of the major predictors of performance. The following hypothesis has been formed in light of the preceding discussion:
