DISCRIMINANT FUNCTION ANALYSIS OF SMALL FARMERS AND LANDLESS IN INDIA*

The small farmers and landless in India are faced with the vicious cycle of low incomes, low savings, low investment and uneconomic size of operational holdings and often are nonviable. Using data for the Haryana State of Northern India for 1977/78, the linear discriminant function was used to identify those factors which will make the majority of small farmers and landless in India a viable entity. Analysis of these data indicated that per hectare fertiliser use, area under high yielding crop varieties, operational size of holding and working capital are the factors which affect the viability of the small farmers and landless. As compared to the simple regression analysis discriminant function approach has been found an effective tool for discriminating the two social groups and for predicting the sponsored social change. However, the use of the discriminant function may be limited if the qualitative independent variable has more than two classes and its orderings are not in sequence.     

THE ANALYSIS OF MEMORY BIAS IN AGRICULTURAL LABOUR DATA COLLECTION: A CASE STUDY OF SMALL FARMERS IN NIGERIA

An analysis is undertaken of daily labour data collected once-per-week for a sample of 129 farm households in Benue State, Nigeria during 1979/80. The purpose of the analysis is to test for the presence of memory bias in these data for which the recall period is up to seven days. The analysis indicates significant between-day differences in hours of agricultural work. This is partly due to the low work input for Sunday but it is also noted that the mean number of hours of agricultural work reported for the day prior to data collection is significantly lower than the means for days further removed from the time of data collection. This finding is taken to be confirmation that a significant level of memory bias exists in the labour data and it is estimated that reported hours of agricultural labour may overstate actual hours of such work by almost 38 per cent.     

MEASURING MANAGEMENT PERFORMANCE OF DAIRY FARMERS

Increased emphasis has centered on methods to measure and predict managerial performance of farmers. In doing this, one of the foremost problems is the development of a reliable and valid criterion variable, because of a number of characteristics of farming and the farm-family complex.
This article discusses problems in developing a criterion of management performance and examines the use of rating techniques for this purpose. Two rating techniques are used to measure management performance on Missouri dairy farms. The results, while suggesting major differences both in the criterion of managerial performance used by different people and in the ratings, identify sources of the differences and opportunities to improve the measuring of management performance.     

DISCRIMINATING CREDIT WORTHINESS OF CANADIAN PRAIRIE FARMERS

Future agriculturists in Canada will rely more heavily on credit as a vehicle to attain income and equity objectives. In order that a lending institution may determine on an a priori basis the credit worthiness of a farm, knowledge of characteristics that determine financial performance of a farm operating with a long-term loan, and the relative weights to be attached to them is required. This paper applies the technique of discriminant analysis in identifying the financially successful farms from others, in order to develop a guide for lending institutions to assess credit worthiness of farms. Prairie farms were stratified on the basis of province and enterprises, thereby leading to nine sub-samples for which a discriminant function was estimated. Two characteristics which were indicated by the analysis to be unfavorable to the credit worthiness of farms are the debt-assets ratio of the farm and the proportion of non-productive debts to total liabilities. Characteristics which were found to be favorable to credit worthiness were the initial level of resources, owned area, and off-farm income (particularly for grain farms) A ?avenir les agriculteurs canadiens devront compter davantage sur le crédit comme moyen ?atteindre le revenu el le profit envisagés. Pour qu'une compagnie de prét puisse déterminer à priori le valeur de crédit ?une ferme, il est nécessaire ?être au courant des facteurs qui déterminent le rendemenl financier ?une ferme opérant à?aide ?un emprunt à long terme et de connaítre la valeur relative de chacun de ces facteurs. Cet article traite de la technique de ?analyse différentieile ulilisée pour reconno tre les fermes qui réussissent ftnancierèment parmi les autres, en vue de dévélopper une marche à suivre à?intention des compagnies de prêt qui évaluent la valeur du crédit des fermes. On a classé les fermes des Prairies ?après la province et ?entreprise agricole, ce qui a donné naissance à neuf sous-divisions pour lesquelles on a évalue une courbe différentieile. Deux caractéridliques, qui ?après ?analyse, se sont révelées défavorables pour ?évaluation de la valeur du crédit des fermes sont les suivants: le rapport dettes-actif de la ferme et le rapport enlre les denes non productives et le passif total. Les facteurs qui se sont avérés favorables à?évaluation du crédit étaient: le montant des ressources à?ohgine, la superftcie possédée el le revenu provenanl de la ferme (particulièrement pour les fermes à grain)     

OCCUPATIONS CHOSEN BY THE SONS OF FARMERS

The Government aims to reduce the number of farmers in this country by encouraging some existing operators to retire. This paper explores an alternative possibility, namely, that of influencing potential new entrants, the majority of whom are farmers' sons. For a number of reasons, sons of existing farmers may find it easier, on leaving school, to stay in agricirlture than to enter other occupations. Later realisation by many of them of the economic prospects and subsequent moves to other jobs represent a waste of human resources to the whole economy as well as causing social hardship to the individual. A recent survey of the occupational choice process of rural schoolboys and students aimed to discover the obstacles, if any, to greater outward mobility. Farmers' sons were compared with others in respect of educational and occupational aspirations, alternative jobs considered, sources of career advice and work values. Some ways are suggested whereby sons whose fathers have farms which are too small to provide a living might be made aware of their own prospects in farming, the range of opportunities open to them and the satisfactions to be gained in other occupations before they commit themselves to an unrewarding strirggle in farming.     

IDENTIFICATION OF FACTORS WHICH INFLUENCE THE TECHNICAL INEFFICIENCY OF INDIAN FARMERS

The agricultural production of Indian farmers is investigated using a stochastic frontier production function which incorporates a model for the technical inefficiency effects. Farm-level data from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) are used. Variables considered in the model for the inefficiency effects include the age and level of education of the farmers, farm size and the year of observation. The parameters of the stochastic frontier production function are estimated simultaneously with those involved in the model for the inefficiency effects. This approach differs from the usual practice of predicting farm-level inefficiency effects and then regressing these upon various factors in a second-stage of modelling. The results indicate that the above factors do have a significant influence upon the inefficiency effects of farmers in two of the three villages considered.     

INCORPORATING MULTIPLE OBJECTIVES IN PLANNING MODELS OF LOW-RESOURCE FARMERS

Linear goal programming provides a means of formally incorporating the multiple goals of a household into the analysis of farming systems. Using this approach, the set of plans which come as close as possible to achieving a set of desired goals under conditions of land and cash scarcity are derived for a Filipino tenant farmer. A challenge in making LGP models empirically operational is the accurate definition of the goals of the farm household being modelled.     

COMPARATIVE INVESTMENT BEHAVIOR OF UNITED STATES AND CANADIAN FARMERS

This study deals with investment decisions of representative Canadian and United States wheat farmers. The results suggest wide variation among farmers in investment behavior but generally larger farmers in both samples and particularly those in the United States, show n close conformity to a wealth maxizing norm.     

SUPPLY RESPONSIVENESS OF RICE FARMERS IN LAGUNA,PHILIPPINES

The supply response and input demand by farmers using modern rice technology in Laguna, Philippines were estimated using profit function analysis. The results indicate that farmers do maximise short-term profits and respond to price changes efficiently. The supply elasticity of rice with respect to its own price was approximately unity. Changes in real wages were estimated to have a greater impact on rice profit and supplies than changes in the real prices of mechanised land preparation, fertiliser or pesticides. Production elasticities derived from the profit function were consistent with those estimated directly from the underlying production function.     

CONCEPTS AND MEASUREMENT OF THE INCOMES,WEALTH AND ECONOMIC WELL-BEING OF FARMERS

Concern over the incomes of farmers has been a fundamental but ill-defined component in the agricultural policies of the UK and many other industrialised countries. Attention is drawn to the inability of the UK's annual White Paper aggregate income figure to reveal much of the income position of farm families. Current income from farming is only a partial measure of the potential spending power of farmers: many have off-farm sources of income which must be taken into account when, for example, assessing poverty and these sources appear to be growing in relative importance. In the longer term, capital gains form part of the returns to landowning farmers but are usually ignored. The frequently-found combination of low current incomes and great wealth has prompted the use of a measure of economic status which combines the two. A prime requirement appears to be a more precise statement of the aims of income policy and the use of income measures most appropriate to the circumstances.     

RISK ATTITUDES AMONGST AUSTRALIAN FARMERS

A procedure for the measurement of risk attitudes is developed and applied. The data for the analysis were obtained from a survey in which 201 farmers throughout Australia were asked to provide points of indifference between sure amounts of income and risky prospects. Although the conclusions from this pilot study are of a tentative nature, it is suggested that risk aversion is the most prevalent risk attitude in the agricultural sector. However, the average degree of risk aversion is relatively small and, in an expected utility context, farmers gave a wide variety of responses. The latter result highlights the need to consider the size distribution of risk attitudes in economic modelling. Influences of socioeconomic and other variables on risk attitudes are examined. The results, when considered jointly with other studies, emphasise the desirability of further research into the determination of risk attitudes.     

THE IMPACT OF INFLATION ON PRICES RECEIVED AND PAID BY GREEK FARMERS

This paper investigates empirically the impact of inflation on the terms of trade, prices received and paid, for Greek farmers in the period 1967–87. According to conventional theory, inflation can have a non-neutral effect if it is unanticipated and if prices received and paid by farmers exhibit different degrees of flexibility. However, in the case where prices are administered, inflation neutrality depends on government's policy objectives and ability to adjust prices of inputs and outputs to the rate of inflation. The empirical investigation undertaken in this study shows that pricing policies implemented by the Greek government have resulted in neutralising the impact of inflation on the terms of trade for Greek farmers. Furthermore, the observed significant variability of the terms of trade can be attributed solely to real demand and supply factors.     

AN APPLICATION OF BASS'S MODEL IN THE ANALYSIS OF DIFFUSION OF COCOA-SPRAYING CHEMICALS AMONG NIGERIAN COCOA FARMERS

Several studies on the process of diffusion of agricultural innovations have recently emerged in the literature. They serve as an important link between studies on the establishment of innovations and those in their impact on the economy. However, previous standard diffusion models used in the analysis of diffusion of agricultural innovations assume that the population of potential adopters is identical and that they are all imitators. This assumption may not be realistic in all cases. Hence, it is argued, in this study, that the population of potential adopters is not identical but consists of both innovators and imitators, and a model incorporating the two categories of potential adopters is employed. This model is also assessed against the standard diffusion model to test its superiority. Although the data on the diffusion of cocoa-spraying chemicals among Nigerian cocoa farmers fit the model well, the result of its statistical evaluation shows little or no improvement over the standard model. This may, however, be due to the nature and composition of the data employed and the need for further refinement of the model.     

小城镇土地可持续利用探讨

伴随小城镇的快速发展,其土地利用不可持续日益凸显,在对小城镇土 地利用面临主要问题分析的基础上,提出小城镇土地利用的对策与建议。     

解决“三农”问题的产业化途径——发展粮食深加工

2004年,我国一系列政策都突出强调了增加农民收入的紧迫性、重要性,并将发展农业产业化经营,搞好主产区粮食加工增值转化作为解决“三农”问题的主要途径之一。一、农业产业化是解决“三农”问题的必由之路随着市场经济体制的不断完善和市场竞争日趋激烈,农民以家庭作为一个经济实体进入市场,并按市场要求安排生产和进行商品交换的超小规模、高度分散的经营组织方式与大市场之间的矛盾便日益显露,致使农民在流通中所获利益和生产效率越来越低,农业的比较利益和竞争中地位逐步下降,农业发展速度和农民收入增长趋缓、城乡差距有所扩大。只有发…     

TURNING FARMERS INTO FORESTERS VIA MARKET LIBERALISATION

Reform of the Common Agricultural Policy and public concern over the environment have brought woodland into the public eye as an environment-friendly alternative land use in British agriculture. Survey evidence indicates that whilst it is the inadequacy of the returns from woodland that acts as the principal deterrent to planting, there are also a number of other factors that discourage woodland adoption. Of these, the perceived lack of flexibility that is associated with woodland figures highly. In part, loss of flexibility occurs due to the strength of controls such as felling licences and Tree Preservation Orders that restrict the conversion of woodland back to agricultural land. This paper develops a simple comparative static model of the way in which such restrictions impact on the allocation and price of woodland vis-à-vis agricultural land. Where felling controls are in operation they may reduce as well as preserve the area of woodland, and retard the efficacy of financial incentives. In this light, policymakers may do well to abolish felling restrictions on new woodland (possibly in conjunction with enhanced woodland incentives generally) if expansion of the wooded area is an explicit objective of future agricultural policy.