Decomposition of gender differentials in agricultural productivity in Ethiopia

A number of studies document gender differentials in agricultural productivity. However, they are limited to region and crop‐specific estimates of the mean gender gap. This article improves on previous work in three ways. First, data representative at the national level and for a wide variety of crops is exploited. Second, decomposition methods—traditionally used in the analysis of wage gender gaps—are employed. Third, heterogeneous effects by women's marital status and along the productivity distribution are analyzed. Drawing on data from the 2011–2012 Ethiopian Rural Socioeconomic Survey, we find an overall 23.4 percentage point productivity differential in favor of men, of which 13.5 percentage points (57%) remain unexplained after accounting for gender differences in land manager characteristics, land attributes, and access to resources. The magnitude of the unexplained fraction is large relative to prior estimates in the literature. A more detailed analysis suggests that differences in the returns to extension services, land certification, land extension, and product diversification may contribute to the unexplained fraction. Moreover, the productivity gap is mostly driven by non‐married female managers—particularly divorced women—; married female managers do not display a disadvantage. Finally, overall and unexplained gender differentials are more pronounced at mid‐levels of productivity.     

The impact of strengthening agricultural extension services on women farmers: Evidence from Ethiopia

This paper evaluates the effect of the Rural Capacity Building Project (RCBP), which aimed at promoting growth by strengthening the agricultural service systems in Ethiopia, and by making them more responsive to smallholders’ needs, in particular women farmers. We examine the gender‐differentiated impact of the RCBP using panel data on 1,485 geographically dispersed households in project and control kebeles. We find that women farmers’ access and satisfaction with extension services increased significantly immediately after the start of the project, but that effect did not last into the medium term. The project led to an increase in the adoption of high‐value crop farming, area of land cultivated, and economic participation of household members, benefiting male‐ and female‐headed households equally. Results point to the positive impact of incorporating women's needs and constraints in the design of the agricultural extension system. However, the project was not able to reduce the preexisting gender gap in agricultural outcomes.     

Impact of cooperatives on smallholders' commercialization behavior: evidence from Ethiopia

This article examines the impact of marketing cooperatives on smallholder commercialization of cereals using detailed household data in rural Ethiopia. We use the strong government role in promoting the establishment of cooperatives to justify the use of propensity score matching to compare households that are cooperative members to similar households in comparable areas without cooperatives. The analysis reveals that although cooperatives obtain higher prices for their members, they are not associated with a significant increase in the overall share of cereal production sold commercially by their members. However, these average results hide considerable heterogeneity across households. In particular, we find that smaller farmers tend to reduce their marketed output as a result of higher prices, whereas the opposite is true for larger farmers.     

The impact of the use of new technologies on farmers’ wheat yield in Ethiopia: evidence from a randomized control trial

In 2013, Ethiopia's Agricultural Transformation Agency introduced the Wheat Initiative to increase smallholder productivity. In this article, we measure the impacts of the Wheat Initiative package of technologies, and its marketing assistance component alone, on yields among a promotional group of farmers. The package includes improved techniques, improved inputs, and a guaranteed market for the crop. Relying on crop‐cut measures and farmers’ own assessments, we find that full package led to an average 14% higher yields. Implementation of the Wheat Initiative was successful in making certified seed and fertilizer accessible to farmers and increasing their uptake, though only 61% of the intervention group adopted row planting and few farmers received marketing assistance. The measured yield difference may underestimate the true yield difference associated with the technology because of incomplete adoption of the recommended practices by intervention farmers and adoption of some practices by control farmers.     

Sustainable agricultural intensification practices and cost efficiency in smallholder maize farms: Evidence from Ethiopia

Sustainable agricultural intensification (SAI) practices have been promoted in developing countries to improve farm productivity and environmental services. However, it is still unclear whether use of a combination of SAI practices has a significant influence on the cost efficiency of smallholder farms. This study investigates whether the cost efficiency of smallholder maize producers in Ethiopia depends on use of input-augmenting and agronomic SAI practices. Stochastic cost frontier models that account for heterogeneity across farms are used for estimation. We find that the use of individual SAI practices increases cost while the combined use of the practices reduces it. The marginal effect on cost reduction is substantial when SAI practices are set at their sample maximum levels. Overall, the results demonstrate the benefit of using a combination of SAI practices in minimizing production cost while addressing the adverse effects of soil degradation and climate variability. To enhance food security, smallholder farm incomes and the sustainability of production in developing countries, policy programs should focus on promoting packages of input-augmenting and agronomic SAI practices.     

Modern variety adoption and risk management in drought prone areas: insights from the sorghum farmers of eastern Ethiopia

Adoption rates of improved or modern varieties (MV) of sorghum in eastern Ethiopia are generally low. Although these MV may represent an effective means of coping with droughts, given their early maturing traits, landraces could prove to be more drought‐tolerant and better adapted to marginal production conditions. Whether MV adoption is a risk reducing technology is very much an empirical question which this article investigates using a unique dataset from eastern Ethiopia in a year of extreme weather conditions. Results show that risk‐factors coupled with access to markets and social capital drive farmers’ decisions to adopt MVs. On the one hand, it appears that farmers use MVs to mitigate moderate risks. On the other hand, farmers who have been most vulnerable to extreme weather events are less likely to use MVs suggesting that MV adoption does not necessarily represent an effective means of coping with drought. Finally, findings show that MV growers are more likely to be affected by sorghum failure once controlling for exogenous production factors.     

Explaining gender differentials in agricultural production in Nigeria

This article uses data from the General Household Survey Panel 2010–2011 to analyze differences in agricultural productivity across male and female plot managers in Nigeria. The analysis utilizes the Oaxaca‐Blinder decomposition method, which allows for decomposing the unconditional gender gap into: (i) the portion caused by observable differences in the factors of production (endowment effect) and (ii) the unexplained portion caused by differences in returns to the same observed factors of production (structural effect). The analysis is conducted separately for the North and South regions, excluding the west of the country. The findings show that in the North, women produce 28% less than men after controlling for observed factors of production, while there are no significant gender differences in the South. In the decomposition results, the structural effect in the North is larger than the endowment at the mean. Although women in the North have access to less productive resources than men, the results indicate that even if given the same level of inputs, significant differences still emerge. However, for the South, the decomposition results show that the endowment effect is more important than the structural effect. Access to resources explains most of the gender gap in the South and if women are given the same level of inputs as men, the gap will be minimal. The difference in the results for the North and South suggests that policy should vary by region.     

Supply response in Ethiopia: accounting for technical inefficiency

Few empirical studies of supply response using the profit function have accounted for technical inefficiency. Using farm‐level panel data from Ethiopia, this study examines the effect of incorporating technical inefficiency in estimating the supply response of peasant farmers. Two systems of output supply and input demand equations are estimated and compared: the conventional model in which technical efficiency is assumed and another in which technical inefficiency is explicitly incorporated. The model with technical inefficiency is preferred on grounds of theoretical consistency and improved estimates, although model comparison tests are not conclusive. Incorporation of inefficiency generally increases the magnitudes and the statistical significance of own price elasticities, substantially so in the case of fertilizer and fertilizer‐intensive crops, and alters the priority attached to nonprice factors. An important result is that only the specification with inefficiency reveals a significant effect of access to extension services on output. Only this specification finds that output increases with household size, which one expects as the farms in the sample are largely subsistence and producing for own consumption. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that farmers' response to incentives is considerably restricted by inefficiency, suggesting that the traditional model would overstate response by excluding the efficiency variable.     

Gender and agricultural productivity: implications of the Farm Input Subsidy Program in Malawi

Alleviating gender differences in agricultural productivity is vital for poverty reduction. While numerous studies suggest that gender differences in agricultural productivity are a result of female farmers having limited access to resources, few studies investigate the role of agricultural interventions in alleviating the constraints to input use and subsequently the gender gap in productivity. This study investigates whether there are gendered gains in agricultural productivity from participating in an input subsidy program and if these gains help reduce the gender gap. Using nationally representative data that is disaggregated at the plot level, this study analyzes the large‐scale voucher‐based Farm Input Subsidy Program in Malawi. Focusing on the total value of output per hectare, relationships are identified using weighted estimators, where the weights are constructed from propensity scores, and spatial fixed effects, to address the unobservable factors that may confound the relationship between program participation and productivity. The findings suggest that participation in the program improves agricultural productivity for both male and female farmers but it does not provide disproportionate help to female famers to overcome gender disparities in agricultural productivity. This suggests that female farmers face additional constraints to productivity apart from nonlabor input use.     

Property rights in a very poor country: tenure insecurity and investment in Ethiopia

This article provides evidence from one of the poorest countries in the world that the institutions of property rights matter for efficiency, investment, and growth. With all land state‐owned, the threat of land redistribution never appears far off the agenda. Land rental and leasing have been made legal, but transfer rights remain restricted and the perception of continuing tenure insecurity remains quite strong. Using a unique panel data set, this study investigates whether transfer rights and implied tenure insecurity affect household investment decisions, focusing on trees and shrubs. The panel data estimates suggest that limited perceived transfer rights negatively affects the long‐term investment in Ethiopian agriculture, contributing to the low returns from land and perpetuating low growth and poverty.     

Information,efficiency, and welfare in agricultural markets

Information and communications technologies (ICTs) have spread rapidly in the developing world. There has been considerable interest in the potential role ICTs, particularly mobile phones, have begun to play in the marketing of agricultural outputs in these countries. In this article, we discuss the potential impacts ICTs may have on welfare, both in terms of potential efficiency gains (via improved arbitrage), and welfare transfers among agents in the supply chain (via reduced informational asymmetries and market power). We also review the recent empirical evidence for such effects.     

Do farmers benefit from participating in specialty markets and cooperatives? The case of coffee marketing in Costa Rica1

Historically low prices in the conventional coffee market have caused financial and social hardship among coffee farmers. In the face of this crisis, specialty markets have attracted the attention of the international donor community. These market segments have shown consistent growth over the last decade and exhibit price premiums in international markets. Therefore, if higher prices are passed on to farmers, access to specialty markets could help to alleviate the crisis brought on by low prices in the conventional sector. The present study attempts to identify the factors that determine farmers' participation in specialized markets and whether participation in these markets leads to higher prices for farmers. A two-stage model is used to analyze farmers' marketing decisions and their effect on the prices received. This procedure allows us to control for the endogeneity bias introduced by the marketing choice. Our results indicate that farmers participating in the specialty coffee segment do in fact receive higher prices than those participating in conventional channels. Additionally, we find that participation in cooperatives has a positive impact on the probability that a farmer chooses to grow specialty coffee and analogously on the prices that they receive. Based on these results, it seems that efforts to increase participation in the specialty coffee segment and in cooperatives would help to lessen some of the hardships brought on by low prices in the conventional coffee sector.     

Sharecropping efficiency in Ethiopia: threats of eviction and kinship

We tested a theoretical model with the Marshallian inefficiency (H1) and threat of eviction (H2) hypotheses having opposite effects on land productivity on sharecropped plots. The model also assumes that kinship contracts may eliminate or reduce the Marshallian inefficiency (H3) and threat of eviction (H4) effects on land productivity. Our empirical findings were consistent with H2 and H4 being true. We found higher land productivity on sharecropped plots than on share tenants' own plots and higher land productivity on sharecropped plots of nonkin than of kin tenants. The nature of the data allowed controlling for unobservable household characteristics through household fixed effects and for observable plot characteristics. Analyses with and without plot characteristics revealed that these findings were stronger with plot characteristics than without them. Based on the plausible assumption that observable plot characteristics are positively correlated with unobservable plot characteristics this strengthens our conclusion. The results are also supported by first-order stochastic dominance analysis. Sharecropped plots' output value distribution unambiguously dominated the output value distribution from share tenants' own plots. Nonkin sharecropped plots' output value distribution also first-order stochastically dominated the output value distribution from kin sharecrop plots.     

Fueling agricultural growth in India: Some reflections

Indian agriculture is experiencing under-performance despite increased attention given to it in the recent past. This paper analyzes the disparities in agricultural growth across Indian states and explores the determinants of agricultural growth, using Panel Corrected Standard Error approach. Analysis using beta convergence shows that the disparities across the state's agricultural growth are narrowing down for the period 1980–1981 to 2011–2012. However, to stimulate growth in the states where agriculture is lagging behind, a higher emphasis on increasing the area under irrigation, expenditure on agricultural research, area under fruits and vegetables, number of regulated markets, length of roads, cold storage facilities and institutional credit for investment purposes is needed. Private sector should be involved in public–private-partnership mode for improving the infrastructure in this sector.     

Markets and pro-poor agricultural growth: insights from livelihood and informal rural economy models in Malawi

This article presents the development of a set of programming models describing the major features of different rural livelihoods and of the informal rural economy they together make up in Malawi. The models allow for differentiated responses by different household types to change and for the partial equilibrium effects of consequent supply, demand, and price adjustments in labor and grain markets. The models provide insights into the relations between own‐farm and nonown‐farm activities in different households' livelihoods and in the informal rural economy as a whole, and are used to investigate possible impacts of increasing cash crop prices and of a more open rural economy. Impacts of these changes on the poor are found to be critically dependent upon supply and demand elasticities in labor and grain markets, but the poor could potentially suffer significant losses from increased openness of the local economy leading to increased expenditure by less poor households on imported goods and services.     

Agricultural technology and child labor: evidence from India

Child labor continues to be a major problem in developing countries, particularly in agricultural countries. The latest ILO global report points out that nine out of every ten child laborers is involved in the agricultural sector. The focus of this article is on the rural sector in India, a country where child labor continues to be prevalent. A number of factors have been found to significantly influence the extent of child labor. This article will focus on the type of technology utilized in the agricultural sector. Technology is divided into two types: biochemical and mechanical. The empirical results indicate that biochemical technology has both positive and negative effects on child labor. However, mechanical technology is found to have a statistically significant and negative impact on child labor.     

Women farmers’ participation in the agricultural research process: implications for agricultural sustainability in Ethiopia

Empowering women farmers to participate in agricultural research is a key strategy for sustainable agricultural development. Women empowerment has the potential to improve their roles in agricultural production while enhancing nutrition and food security. Although new agricultural development policies are focusing on improving women engagement in agriculture, there is limited literature on women empowerment in relation to agricultural research. This study used mixed methods to analyse women farmers’ participation in four stages of the agricultural research process – design, testing, dissemination, monitoring and evaluation. Two hundred and thirty individual interviews with women farmers and 16 focus group discussions with men and women farmers were conducted in four Woredas (districts) of Ethiopia. Quantitative data were analysed using binary and multivariate probit models. Qualitative data were analysed using line-by-line coding. The results showed that several empowerment indicator variables significantly (p?≤?.001) influenced women’s participation in different stages of agricultural research. Specifically, input in production decisions, autonomy in plot management, membership to farmer groups, and ability to speak in public enhanced women’s participation in different stages, in addition to access to information and extension services, education and land size. Cultural norms hindered women’s empowerment and engagement in research. To foster sustainable agriculture development, it’s important to integrate holistic and proactive gender perspectives into research strategies to increase women’s participation in farmer research groups, access information and knowledge, have voice and challenge constraining cultural norms and traditions.     

Marketing,cooperatives and price heterogeneity: evidence from the CIS dairy sector

Drawing on survey data, this article identifies the determinants of variations in farm gate milk prices for three CIS countries (Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine). We apply a multi‐level modeling approach, specifically a bootstrapped mixed‐effects linear regression model. The analysis suggests three main strategies to improve the price received by farmers for their output: consolidation, competition for output, and stable supply chain relationships. In Armenia and Ukraine selling through a marketing cooperative has a significant, positive, albeit modest, effect on farm gate milk prices. In all three countries studied, the size of dairy operations, trust, and contracting also affect positively the prices received by farmers.     

Price shock transmission: evidence from the wheat‐bread market value chain in Ethiopia

This study assesses the degree of vertical price transmission along the wheat‐bread value chain in Ethiopia. This is pursued by applying a vector error correction model and an impulse response analysis using monthly price data for the period 2000–2015. Our analysis considers transmission of price shocks across different market levels, including from the international and domestic wheat grain markets at the upstream to the domestic wheat bread market at the downstream of the value chain. The empirical findings indicate that significant cointegration exists across prices of the different market stages. There is a transmission from international prices to domestic prices at downstream markets, in particular to flour and bread prices. Prices at upstream markets are largely influenced by the domestic wholesale market. In general, the speed of adjustment is quite slow with a half‐life of about one year for restoring the equilibrium price relationship. As price margins between the different market stages in the value chain have substantially decreased in the last 15 years, higher transmission, and thus exposure to international market shocks, can be expected in the future. The results also show that causal relationships exist between prices at different market stages—with the wholesale market identified as the key market level where prices and price expectations are formed.     

Efficiency–equity tradeoffs and the scope for resource reallocation in agricultural research: evidence from Nigeria

On the basis of projected economic and poverty impacts of alternative commodity research programs, this article assessed efficiency and equity tradeoffs and the scope for research resource reallocation in Nigeria. Given the importance of major food staples to both poor and nonpoor households in production and consumption, introducing a poverty dimension revealed no significant shift in priorities compared with those implied by efficiency. The results showed that neither the additional benefits to the poor nor the foregone benefits to society are significant from prioritizing research according to equity—relative to efficiency—criteria. As current priorities are supported by neither efficiency nor equity criteria, however, there is considerable scope for maximizing research benefits to the poor through informed reallocation of research resources. The article concludes with a discussion of the patterns of resource reallocations implied by efficiency and equity criteria.