Female leadership,internet use,and performance of agricultural cooperatives in Vietnam

Supporting agricultural cooperatives might contribute to the livelihood improvement of many small-scale farmers in developing countries. This research examines the factors affecting the internet use of agricultural cooperatives with a focus on female leadership, its effects on cooperatives’ economic, social, and innovative performance, and the distributional effects of internet use on economic performance. Our analysis relied on the data of 3,512 agricultural cooperatives collected in 2021 from Vietnam. We addressed the endogeneity issue of internet use in impact assessment by employing an instrumental variable approach. Our results show that female leadership was positively and significantly associated with internet use and that internet use had a positive and significant effect on returns on assets, returns on equity, labor productivity, payment per laborer, contribution to labor union and insurance per laborer, and innovation in products of agricultural cooperatives. In addition, unconditional quantile regressions show that internet use in agricultural cooperatives exacerbated income inequality. Enhancing female leadership and promoting rural education were recommended to improve agricultural cooperatives’ performance.     

An introduction to rural and agricultural development in the digital age

This special issue contributes to the development economics literature by highlighting the role of information communication and technologies (ICTs) in supporting rural and agricultural development. It is comprised of nine papers. Key findings from this special issue include: (1) internet use increases rural consumption diversity and agricultural productivity; (2) smartphone use empowers rural women in household decision-making and off-farm work participation; (3) smartphone-based agricultural extension services boost rural income growth; (4) a lack of ICT infrastructure and inadequate skills to use digital technologies are two key factors that lead to digital poverty traps for smallholder rural farmers; (5) ICT adoption increases the probability of rural households' access to credit and empowers rural women and farm households in relatively less developed regions to access credit; (6) digital financial inclusion reduces farmers' vulnerability to poverty; and (7) e-commerce adoption increases both sales prices and marketing costs, but the magnitude of increasing the former is higher than the magnitude of increasing the latter, which finally contributes to a higher gross return. This special issue also proposes practical instruments and implications for advancing the application of ICTs in rural areas to accelerate rural and agricultural development in the digital age.     

MACROECONOMIC POLICY REFORMS AND PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH IN AFRICAN AGRICULTURE

This article employs a two‐stage procedure to investigate the impact of macroeconomic policy reforms on the agricultural productivity growth of 33 African countries from 1981 to 2001. In the first stage, we measure agricultural productivity using a nonparametric Malmquist productivity index. In the second stage, we build a generalized method of moments (GMM) model with a measure of structural adjustment program (SAP) intensity as a key instrument for macroeconomic policy reforms. We also control for the effects of globalization, civil violence, level of development of physical and financial infrastructure, and other economic variables as well as natural resource factors that directly affect agricultural productivity. Our results indicate a strong positive correlation between the extent of SAP intensity and agricultural productivity, suggesting that the macroeconomic policy reforms improved agricultural productivity growth in the sample countries. (JEL E6, O13, O41)     

Complementarity and substitutability between farm and nonfarm activities: Evidence from agricultural households in Tanzania

Increasing evidence shows that farm households in developing countries maintain a portfolio of income-generating activities. Concerns have been raised that household income diversification to include nonfarm activities will stifle farm works, and thus reduce agricultural productivity. On the contrary, some evidence of complementarity between the farm and nonfarm activities in rural areas has been found. This paper uses data from the fourth and the fifth waves of Tanzania's National Panel Surveys to examine whether there exists complementarity or substitutability between farm and nonfarm activities in rural Tanzania. The findings show that participation in off-farm work and nonfarm business activities has no clear relationship to the adoption and use of improved agricultural practices, namely, irrigation, fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides. Participation in off-farm work and nonfarm business activities does not also seem to directly influence agricultural investments, production, and productivity nor overall household income. These results suggest that the complementary and substitution effects of nonfarm activities offset each other in Tanzania, implying that proper policies are required to unleash the potential impact of nonfarm activities on agriculture.     

中国农业碳生产率变化的驱动因素与区域差异研究

利用产出距离函数将农业碳生产率变化分解为技术效率、技术进步和要素替代变化,并实证测算1995—2016年中国农业碳生产率的变化及其驱动因素,结果表明:(1)研究期中国农业碳生产率年均提高3.57%,单位GDP碳排放量年均下降3.31%,累计下降50.96%,主要归因于技术进步和要素替代效应。(2)中国农业资本深化对农业碳生产率提升有正向影响,劳动力价格上涨有负向影响。(3)中国农业碳生产率表现出“东高西低,阶梯分布”的空间特征,东南沿海省份和西北省份存在区域“农业碳生产率缺口”,且呈缺口扩大趋势。鉴于此,为提高农业碳生产率提出政策建议。     

The effects of education in early-stage agriculture: some evidence from China

The stochastic production frontier approach is used to study the effects of education on agricultural efficiency for a cross-section of 'early-stage' farms from Guanghan County, Sichuan Province, China. Education for farm families in rural China is multifaceted with a combination of formal education, intragenerational transfer of knowledge within the home, and agricultural extension services. Since our survey data span two different years with markedly different policy environments, we are able to examine not only which aspects of education affect agricultural efficiency, but also whether or not the policy environment matters. We find limited evidence that in a policy environment that is conducive to agriculture, formal education provides positive returns in agriculture. Furthermore, general education may provide greater returns than the more targeted extension services.     

Innovation and productivity in agricultural firms: evidence from a country-wide farm-level innovation survey

ABSTRACT

The literature on the links between innovation and productivity at the firm level in agriculture is almost nonexistent. In this paper, we analyze the factors behind the innovation effort of farms and the impact that innovation effort has on farm’s productivity, exploiting a unique farm-level agricultural innovation survey carried out in Uruguay. The results indicate that farm size, cooperation with other agents to perform R&D, the education of the owner of the farm, the participation of foreign capital and the existence of links with other organizations, in particular scientific, horizontal and vertical ones, are positively correlated with innovation effort. Public and private financial support are not clearly linked with innovation effort. The innovation effort has a positive effect on farm’s productivity. Some heterogeneities across industries in agriculture are found.     

要素生产率和要素配置作用下的中国城乡收入差距

根据城乡生产函数差异的特征事实构建了城乡收入差距模型,利用我国各省1997—2009年数据研究城乡劳动力比、固定资产比、人力资本比、农业中间品投入、工业化和第三产业规模对城乡收入差距的影响。结果显示,我国城乡要素生产率与城乡要素配置的差异对城乡收入差距具有决定性作用;城乡劳动力比的增长明显有助于缩小城乡收入差距,而城乡人力资本比、固定资本投入比、农业成本、以及相邻地区间的相关性都导致了城乡收入差距的扩大。缩小城乡差距的重要途径是加快农村劳动力的城市化、增加农村教育投入、提高农业生产率、增加农村的物质资本投入,各省缩小城乡收入差距的努力对邻近省份也会产生积极影响。     

山区农村空心化调控机制研究

在中国城市化迅速发展的进程中,农村空心化问题日趋严重,尤以城乡差异较大的山区为最。通过对重庆武陵山区进行实地调研,并运用主成分分析法分析社会经济相关数据,发现重庆武陵山区农村空心化现象是由于城市化发展迅速与农村基础设施建设投入不足,农民购买能力增强与现行规划管理调控手段乏力等因素发展不协调引起的。这必然对农村的土地资源、人居环境、新农村建设等方面带来不利影响。鉴于此,提出要加大农村基础设施建设投入,吸引社会资金投资农业开发,促进农业规模化经营,开展农村用地规划,加强政府对农村住宅用地的管理等相关措施,以促使城市与农村在经济发展、空间布局、人口流动等方面协调发展。     

农村基础设施公共投资与农业增长——基于省际面板数据的例证

农业增长离不开生产要素投入的增加和农村基础设施的完善。由于农村基础设施具有技术不可分性、低排他性、不可贸易性等特征,因而应当主要由政府的公共投资来提供。运用1994—2009年期间中国各省、市、自治区的面板数据,通过模型的比较分析,发现耕地投入和农业劳动力投入是不断递减的,但由于农业经营制度变革、公共投资增多、农业技术进步导致劳动生产率提高等原因,农业总产值仍稳步提升。农田水利灌溉、农业科研、农村教育和农村电力等方面的公共投资都能推动农业增长,但由于各项投资的边际影响不同,需要在不同地区有所侧重。研究还发现,农村基础设施公共投资能够明显缩小西部地区与中东部地区的农业发展差距,促进区域经济协调可持续发展。     

FOOD TRADE AND BIODIVERSITY EFFECTS

Pests create biodiversity effects that increase food production risks and decrease productivity when agricultural production is specialized. Pesticides contain these effects, but damage the environment and human health. When opening to trade, governments are tempted to restrict pesticide use because, with more food being imported, less pesticide is needed for domestic consumption. However, pesticide restrictions hinder the competitiveness of their agricultural sector on international markets. We show that restrictions on pesticides are more stringent under free trade than under autarky, which reduces the gains from trade, and that trade increases food price volatility.     

Agricultural Intensification, Common Property Resources and the Farm-Household

This paper evaluates the impact of agricultural price and intensification policies for common property resources and welfare of rural communities in developing countries. In doing so we develop a new model for the farm-household that has analytical advantages over the traditional one and that has significant potential for empirical application. The major findings are: Technical assistance that increase productivity of land-intensive agricultural outputs (cereals, livestock, etc.) cause degradation of the communal resources and may cause immiserization. Policies that increase the prices of these goods cause identical effects. By contrast, similar policies applied to labor-intensive outputs (vegetables, tubers, etc.) contribute to improve the common resources and to increase the welfare of the rural communities.     

银行业竞争能促进乡村产业振兴吗？——基于新质生产力的视角

农业企业高质量发展将夯实乡村振兴之产业基础,带动农民共同富裕,而企业自身发展存在金融需求。本文匹配1998—2015年中国农业企业数据与金融许可证信息,探究银行业竞争对农业企业生产率增长的影响及其机制。结果表明：银行业竞争提升了农业企业生产率,考虑测量误差和内生性问题后结论依然稳健。影响机制分析表明,银行业竞争通过促进贷款可得性来提高农业企业生产率。异质性分析显示,银行业竞争对中小企业生产率的促进作用强于大企业,对老企业生产率的促进作用大于新企业,对民营企业生产率的促进作用大于国有企业与外资企业。同时,企业的资产规模、流动资产、资本密集度、负债水平等对生产率有显著影响。为优化农村金融体系、推动乡村产业振兴提供政策启示。     

Agricultural Productivity and Poverty Reduction in Nepal

This paper provides for the first time a clear quantitative link between agricultural productivity and poverty among rural households in Nepal. Using data from a nationwide Nepal Living Standard Survey 2004, we first estimate household‐specific productivity per worker under both Cobb–Douglas and translog production functions. Second, the paper identifies the determinants of productivity. Third, we explore a theoretical link between productivity and poverty using Sen's poverty index and find empirically that productivity growth substantially helps poverty reduction. Finally, the integrated effects of changes in productivity determinants are found to be stronger than the outcomes of sectoral policies taken in isolation.     

Cropping system diversification,conservation tillage and modern seed adoption in Ethiopia: Impacts on household income,agrochemical use and demand for labor

The type and combination of sustainable agricultural practices (SAPs) adopted have a significant effect on agricultural productivity and food security. This study develops a multinomial endogenous switching regression model of farmers' choice of combination of SAPs and impacts on maize income and agrochemicals and family labor use in rural Ethiopia. Four primary results were found. First, adoption of SAPs increases maize income and the highest payoff is achieved when SAPs are adopted in combination rather than in isolation. Second, nitrogen fertilizer use is lower in the package that contains system diversification and conservation tillage. Third, conservation tillage increased pesticide application and labor demand, perhaps to compensate for reduced tillage. However, when it is used jointly with system diversification, it does not have a significant impact on pesticide and labor use. Fourth, in most cases adoption of a package of SAPs increases women workload, suggesting that agricultural intensification technology interventions may not be gender neutral. This implies that policy makers and other stakeholders promoting a combination of technologies can enhance household food security through increasing income and reducing production costs, but need to be aware of the potential gender related outcomes.     

Link between innovation and productivity in Canadian manufacturing industries

Empirical studies commonly use research and development (R&D) to measure innovation and often find, especially in Canada, no strong link between productivity and innovation. In this article, we model innovation as an unobservable latent variable that underlies four indicators: R&D, patents, technology adoption, and skills. We find that these indicators are reasonably good measures of innovation for aggregate manufacturing. However, except for skills, the reliability of the indicators for innovation differs among individual industries. Our innovation indexes, based on the latent variable model, show that most manufacturing industries became more innovative over the 1980–1997 period. The pace of innovation in the electrical and electronic products industry accelerated during the 1990s. In addition, we show that the new measure of innovation has a positive and statistically significant impact on productivity. It takes from 1 to 3 years, depending on the industry, for innovation to generate an impact on productivity.     

包容性金融发展与城乡居民收入差距*——基于中国内地省级面板数据的实证研究

本文借鉴二元经济增长模型,分析了包容性金融发展与城乡居民收入差距的关系,并采用2011—2015年中国内地省级面板数据,运用面板数据模型和系统GMM模型对理论假设进行了实证检验。实证分析发现：（1）包容性金融发展对缩小城乡居民收入差距具有明显的促进作用;（2）传统银行的金融服务成本、互联网金融的数字支持服务程度对城乡居民收入差距的影响显著为负,这表明,包容性金融发展缩小城乡居民收入差距的直接作用主要是通过降低金融服务成本实现的;（3）传统银行金融包容性在缩小城乡居民收入差距方面的作用,东部比中西部更加明显,而互联网金融包容性对城乡居民收入差距的影响在中西部地区显著。据此,本文提出,应重视包容性金融发展的收入分配效应,以缩小我国城乡居民收入差距。     

Dept and input misallocation of agricultural supply and marketing cooperatives

Kim and Maksimovic provide an empirical model to examine the effect of dept on a firm. Their model is adopted to examine agricultural supply and marketing cooperatives. Using a short-run variable cost function, we find firm efficiency decreases as dept increases. A US$1 increase in indebtedness increases total short-run variable costs by US$0.0167 or roughly 1.67% Dept tends to shift input usage away from labour inputs. A test developed by Conrad and Unger is applied to determine whether the agricultural supply and marketing cooperatives are at a long-run equilibrium capacity. It is found that most of the cooperatives were overinvested in capacity. However,dept does not explain this overinvestment. Finally,the effect of dept on total productivity over the study period is examined. It is found that dept has had a small positive impact on total factor productivity growth. Scale economics and non-optimal capacity had large impacts on total factor productivity. Although dept is associated with short-run misallocation of resources, we find little evidence that dept is associated with long -run suboptimal capacity.     

基础设施影响农村经济发展的统计分析

Based on statistical analysis, this paper states that four types of rural infrastructure as roads, electrcity,communications, and education have statistically significant effects on agricultural production, nonagricultural production, and farmers‘ income in China. However, the specifics and the degrees of these influences are different.Therefore, different policies have to be implemented respectively to make full use of the limited funds in China.Meanwhile, the maturity level of rural infrastructure as with rural economic development has regional discrepancy.The levels of maturity decrease from east to west. it is urgent that the current weak situation of the rural Infrastructure in western China needs to be improved.