Economic Liberalization and Smallholder Productivity in Tanzania. From Promised Success to Real Failure, 1985–1998

In the mid-1980s, Tanzania adopted a programme for economic liberalization of the entire economy, including agriculture. After pressure from the IMF and the World Bank in particular, but also from most of the bilateral donors, agricultural producer and input prices were decontrolled, panterritorial prices were abolished, subsidies were removed and trade in agricultural products and inputs was to a large extent taken over by private traders. The international donor community promised that economic liberalization would provide a strong stimulus to Tanzanian agriculture, resulting in increasing yields, increased labour productivity, rising agricultural production and higher incomes. However, available data show that, as far as food crop production is concerned, this promise has not been fulfilled. Even compared to the 'crisis years' 1979–1984, labour productivity, yields and production per capita of food grains stagnated or declined up to the end of the 1990s. Some causes of this failure are discussed.     

Agricultural input subsidies,extension services,and farm labour productivity nexus: Evidence from maize farmers in Tanzania

This paper examines the effect of agricultural input subsidies (AIS) and agricultural extension services (AES) on farm labour productivity in plots planted with maize in Tanzania, using panel data from the National Panel Survey in Tanzania. To control for the endogeneity of the two programmes, a control function and instrumental variable approach is used to estimate the effects of AIS and AES on farm labour productivity. The results show that AIS and AES are significant in raising labour productivity in maize-planted plots. Similarly, AIS and AES are also effective in increasing land productivity in these plots. Moreover, each programme has comparable effects on land productivity and farm labour productivity. These findings imply that public investments in AIS and AES are effective in raising farm productivity.     

Defining Access to Health Care: Evidence on the Importance of Quality and Distance in Rural Tanzania

We examine the implications of health-seeking behavior on access to quality health care using a unique dataset that combines a household survey from rural Tanzania with the location and quality of all health facilities available to households. Patients do not always visit the nearest facility, but choose from among multiple facilities, improving the quality of care they receive by bypassing low quality facilities. Recognizing this behavior alters the projected benefits to health interventions, reducing the value of focusing on the staff qualifications and increasing the value of focusing on travel time and the motivation of current staff.     

Market Coordination and Social Differentiation: A Comparison of Cotton-Producing Households in Tanzania and Zimbabwe

This paper compares findings from farm surveys conducted in Zimbabwe and Tanzania in 2001. It sets out to answer why some cotton-producing households generate comparatively higher levels of total cotton output, and conversely why some households generate lower output. In the Tanzanian sample, variations in respondents' cotton sales revolve entirely around respondents' access to cropping land and possession of draught power, while observed differences in the Zimbabwean case are based on a combination of ownership-related assets and respondents' access to manufactured inputs. At the same time, the extent of differences in volumes of cotton sales between the top and bottom quintiles is significantly higher in the Tanzanian survey than in the Zimbabwean one. This pattern becomes even more evident when comparing the performance of the bottom quintiles in the two samples. Against this background, the paper suggests that successful forms of market coordination may not only contribute to better 'system performance' but also to fewer differences between cotton-producing households in terms of cotton output and to higher incomes from cotton production.     

粮食主产区耕地健康产能评价 ——以河南省温县为例

研究目的:探寻适合中国新时代耕地产能评价的新理论与方法,界定耕地健康产能内涵,构建评价指标体系,并应用河南省温县验证。研究方法:基于"需求—功能—维度—要素—指标"理论框架,构建耕地健康产能评价指标体系,运用综合算法、"1+X"累加模型法、图层叠加法定量评价耕地健康产能。研究结果:(1)温县耕地产能和耕地健康诊断结果地域分异特征明显,以青峰岭为界,北部耕地产能和健康状况较南部好;(2)耕地健康产能整体状况良好,乡镇间差异明显;(3)耕地健康产能结果更多取决于耕地健康诊断,主要受耕地生产环境和耕地系统弹性影响。研究结论:耕地健康产能评价指标体系和评价方法有应用性。     

The Diffusion of New Agricultural Technologies: The Case of Crossbred-Cow Technology in Tanzania

The recent literature on agricultural technology adoption shows that diffusion of new technologies varies significantly across space and time. Furthermore, puzzles exist about why some seemingly profitable technologies are not adopted, especially in livestock production. We employ a hazard or duration function to explain diffusion of crossbred-cow technology in a unique sample of Tanzania farmers. A farmer's adoption of crossbred technology depends positively on the proximity of his farm to other users, on his schooling, and on his access to credit and contact with extension agents.     

Reducing Pesticide Use and Pesticide Impact by Productivity Growth: the Case of Dutch Arable Farming

This paper employs a dynamic Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model to measure the composition of productivity growth of pesticides and the environmental impacts of pesticides. The application focuses on panel data of Dutch arable farms over the period 2003–07. A bootstrap regression model is used to explain farmers' performance, providing empirical evidence of the impact of producer‐specific characteristics and environmental factors. The results show that Dutch arable farms have substantial inefficiency in the use of pesticides and high pesticide environmental inefficiency, and appear rather unconcerned about the environmental impacts of their current pesticide use decisions on next period's production environment.     

The regulatory framework, unplanned development and urban poverty: Findings from Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

The regulatory framework adopted in many urban areas of the developing countries has been blamed for aiming at unrealistically high standards and for being bureaucratic, thus putting legal land and shelter out of reach of poor households. The latter end up living in unplanned settlements, which develop irregularly, sometimes on marginal land, lacking basic infrastructure. Poverty is therefore perpetuated. This paper evaluates planning standards and administrative procedures as applied to a specific scheme at the outskirts of the city of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. It is shown that the high standards for plot sizes and road reserves resulted into the production of only 3900 instead of 15,000 plots over the same area, had more realistic standards been adopted. The unit cost per plot would have been a quarter of what it came to be. Centralised and bureaucratic set-ups and procedures resulted into unnecessarily long periods before planning schemes could be implemented; or land, certificates of title or building permits made available to would-be developers. Many develop the land without these permits or titles. Land was much easier to get in unplanned areas but converting it to legality was virtually impossible.The policy framework supports the revision of planning standards; the incorporation of communities and the private sector in land delivery; and the decentralisation and streamlining of procedures. In practice, officials aim at high standards, centralised and lengthy administrative procedures, and direct public sector involvement in land delivery. Evidence is provided of the deleterious effects of the continued hesitation to address the regulatory framework whose revision downwards would result into more legal land being available, faster and at a lower cost; thus reaching more of the low income households, reducing unplanned development and making a positive impact on dealing with urban poverty.     

Decomposition of Productivity Growth Using Distance Functions: The Case of Dairy Farms in Three European Countries

Within an output distance function framework, the Total Factor Productivity growth index is decomposed into four components (technical change, technical and allocative efficiency, and scale component). We estimate stochastic translog output distance functions using panel data from dairy farms over the period 1991–94 for three European countries (Germany, the Netherlands, and Poland). Results indicate that the change in the productivity growth index in Germany (+6%) and Poland (−5%) are mainly dictated by the technical change component. In contrast, the productivity growth index in the Netherlands (+3%) is influenced by allocative efficiency components.     

Between dependence and deprivation: The interlocking nature of land alienation in Tanzania

Studies of accumulation by dispossession in the Global South tend to focus on individual sectors, for example, large‐scale agriculture or nature conservation. Yet smallholder farmers and pastoralists are affected by multiple processes of land alienation. Drawing on the case of Tanzania, we illustrate the analytical purchase of a comprehensive examination of dynamics of land alienation across multiple sectors. To begin with, processes of land alienation through investments in agriculture, mining, conservation, and tourism dovetail with a growing social differentiation and class formation. These dynamics generate unequal patterns of land deprivation and accumulation that evolve in a context of continued land dependency for the vast majority of the rural population. Consequently, land alienation engenders responses by individuals and communities seeking to maintain control over their means of production. These responses include migration, land tenure formalization, and land transactions, that propagate across multiple localities and scales, interlocking with and further reinforcing the effects of land alienation. Various localized processes of primitive accumulation contribute to a scramble for land in the aggregate, providing justifications for policies that further drive land alienation.     

Productivity and Land Enhancing Technologies in Northern Ethiopia: Health, Public Investments, and Sequential Adoption

The adoption of more efficient farming practices and technologies that enhance agricultural productivity and improve environmental sustainability is instrumental for achieving economic growth, food security, and poverty alleviation in sub-Saharan Africa. Our research examines the interaction between public investments, community health, and adoption of productivity and land enhancing technologies by households in the northern Ethiopian state of Tigray. Agricultural technology adoption decisions are modeled as a sequential process where the timing of choices can matter. We find that time spent sick and opportunity costs of caring for sick family members are significant factors in adoption. Sickness, through its impact on household income and labor allocation decisions for healthcare and other activities, significantly reduces the likelihood of technology adoption. Our findings suggest that agencies working to improve agricultural productivity and land resource conservation should consider not only the financial status of potential adopters, but also their related health situation.     

The Effect of Investment,LFA and Agri-environmental Subsidies on the Components of Total Factor Productivity: The Case of Slovenian Farms

The effect of subsidies on the performance of farms has received a great deal of attention in the literature, although results are inconclusive. Furthermore, much of the related literature examines the effect of subsidies only on technical efficiency (TE). We examine the effect of different types of subsidies on the different components of total factor productivity (TFP) in Slovenian agriculture over the period 2006–2013. We first estimate a Random Parameter Stochastic production frontier model. Then, based on the estimates of this model, we calculate and decompose the TFP index into TE, scale efficiency and technological change. Third, we apply combined difference-in-difference and a matching estimator to examine the effect of investment, less favoured area (LFA) and agri-environmental (AE) subsidies on the different components of TFP. In our case, these subsidies are found to have no significant effect on either TFP or on its components.     

Land and contract farming: Changes in the distribution and meanings of land in Kilombero,Tanzania

In the context of contract farming of sugarcane in an outgrower scheme in Tanzania, this paper explores how the scheme has fundamentally altered people's relationships with the land over the last 50 years, in particular, since 1999, when, after three decades, the sugar parastatal was privatized. The paper reviews the literature on the mutual relationship between contract farming and land ownership and examines the scheme with a focus on long-term changes in the forms of land acquisitions and land use. We argue that the meaning and importance of landownership in contract farming schemes needs to be reassessed if participation in contract farming entails a departure from previous forms of acquiring land, generates new spatial patterns of agricultural production, and necessitates additional economic and social resources in order to transform land into an economic asset.     

农业龙头企业生产率及效率分析--以南京市为例

农业企业是推动农业技术不断进步的主体力量，农业企业的技术进步是实现农业可持续发展和提升农业整体竞争力的关键要素。农业企业的生产率及效率状况在很大程度会影响整个农业的增长与发展。本文根据新古典理论及生产函数理论，构造了农业企业前沿生产函数的线性规划模型，并以南京市为例对南京市农业企业成长过程中技术进步的作用进行了实证研究。     

EU Food Safety Standards,Pesticide Use and Farm‐level Productivity: The Case of High‐value Crops in Kenya

This article provides an empirical analysis of the impact of European Union (EU) private food safety standards on pesticide use and farm‐level productivity among small‐scale vegetable producers in Kenya. We apply an extended three‐stage damage control production framework, accounting for multiple endogeneity problems, to farm‐level data collected from a random cross‐sectional sample of 539 small‐scale producers. Estimation results show that farmers producing vegetables for the domestic market use significantly lower quantities of pesticides than do export farmers. However, contrary to findings elsewhere, the econometric evidence here shows that both domestic and export‐oriented vegetable farmers in Kenya use pesticides at levels below the economic optimum. The results also show that the adoption of standards by export farmers does not have any significant impact on total pesticide use. However, adopter categories are distinguishable in terms of types of pesticide used, i.e. adopters use safer pesticides based on World Health Organization (WHO) classification. The third‐stage structural revenue model results demonstrate that adoption of standards has a positive and significant impact on revenue raised in vegetable production. Nevertheless, farmers producing for the export market are indistinguishable from those producing for the domestic farmers in terms of the total revenue earned from producing vegetables during the rainy season, on a ‘per acre’ basis. Although standards can potentially prevent resource‐poor smallholders from maintaining their position in the lucrative export markets, they can also result in positive changes in the production systems of those small‐scale farmers who adopt it, as shown by these results.     

Poverty Reduction Effects of Agricultural Technology Adoption: The Case of Improved Cassava Varieties in Nigeria

We use DNA‐fingerprinting to estimate the poverty reduction effect of adoption of improved cassava varieties in Nigeria. We estimate the counterfactual household income distribution of cassava producers by combining farm‐level treatment effects with a market‐level model. Our results suggest that adoption of improved cassava varieties has led to a 4.6 percentage point reduction in poverty, though this is sensitive to the measurement of adoption status. Therefore, accurate measurement of adoption is crucial for a more credible estimate of the poverty reduction effect of adoption. Our analysis also suggests that farmers who are more likely to be adopters are also likely to face higher structural costs. Addressing structural barriers that make improved technologies less profitable for the poor would therefore be important to increase the poverty reduction effect of improved cassava varieties.     

Specification and Estimation of Production Functions Involving Damage Control Inputs: A Two-Stage, Semiparametric Approach

Productivity assessment of damage control inputs (such as pesticides) is complicated because their effect depends on the exposure to damage agents (such as pests). We discuss some open specification and estimation issues. The contribution is threefold. First, we elaborate the separability conditions for the damage control function and production function. Second, we employ a two-stage semiparametric technique to combine attractive features of both nonparametric and parametric approaches. Third, we model the interaction between pest exposure and damage control inputs by using slope dummies. An application to productivity analysis of small scale Bt cotton production in China illustrates the approach.     

A Question of Integrity: Variants of Bt Cotton,Pesticides and Productivity in Pakistan

Bt cotton remains one of the most widely grown biotech crops among smallholder farmers in lower income countries, and numerous studies attest to its advantages. However, the effectiveness of Bt toxin, which depends on many technical constraints, is heterogeneous. In Pakistan, the diffusion of Bt cotton occurred despite a weak regulatory system and without seed quality control; whether or not many varieties sold as Bt are in fact Bt is also questionable. We utilise nationally representative sample data to test the effects of Bt cotton use on productivity. Unlike previous studies, we invoke several indicators of Bt identity: variety name, official approval status, farmer belief, laboratory tests of Bt presence in plant tissue, and biophysical assays measuring Bt effectiveness. Only farmer belief affects cotton productivity in the standard production model, which does not treat Bt appropriately as damage‐abating. In the damage control framework, all Bt indicators reduce damage from pests. Biophysical indicators have the largest effect and official approval has the weakest. Findings have implications for impact measurement. For policy‐makers, they suggest the need, on ethical and productivity grounds, to improve variety information and monitor variety integrity closer to point of sale.     

The Post‐Privatization Role of Out‐growers' Associations in Rural Capital Accumulation: Contract Farming of Sugar Cane in Kilombero,Tanzania

Contract farming is widely promoted by multilateral agencies as an engine of economic growth in developing countries. The agencies often stress the need for governments to create strong farmers' organizations that can shoulder the risks associated with contractual relationships with large corporations. However, empirical studies of farmers' organizations in contractual schemes are few and tend to dismiss the performances of these organizations for not measuring up to donor expectations. This paper seeks to offer a more unbiased examination of what farmer's organizations actually do by recounting the development of out‐growers' associations in a contract farming scheme in central Tanzania. The paper explores the new space for social organization and business operations which emerged after privatization in 1998. It is argued that under certain conditions, out‐grower associations occupy a crucial position with regard to classic agrarian questions of land, labour and capital accumulation.