scholarly journals Measuring   Farm Technical Efficiency using Stochastic Frontier Production Function Model Approach

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mercy Ebere Ndubueze-Ogaraku ◽  
Anil Graves

Abstract Agricultural productivity in Africa is the lowest in the world with many households not able to feed themselves. In Africa women make up 70–80% of the labour forces in the agricultural sector and play a core role in agriculture but underperform in terms of productivity largely because they lack access to physical and human resources. Well-being, a health resource is an important asset in production because people can work when they are healthy. The study is aimed to analyze farm technical efficiency of women farmers in Niger Delta, Nigeria. 216 female farmers were randomly selected from 18 communities of the three states in Niger Delta Nigeria. Stochastic production frontier function model was the analytical tools used. The result showed that farm size and labour positively influenced technical efficiency and was significant at 1% with a mean value of 68.8%. Farm efficiency level in Delta and Akwa Ibom States are not significantly different. However, technical efficiency level in both Delta and Akwa Ibom States are significantly different from Rivers State. Inefficiency variables of age and number of years spent schooling were significant at 5% and 10% level respectively. The study recommends that women should increase the use of farm plots and labour resource for higher productivity.

2012 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
MA Baree

An attempt was made to determine the overall farm-specific technical efficiency or inefficiency of onion farms of Bangladesh. Farm-level data were used for the estimation of the parameters of Cobb-Douglas stochastic frontier production function. The model for technical inefficiency effects in the stochastic frontier included age, experience, education, and farm size. The elasticity of output with respect to land, labour, and capital cost was estimated to be positive values of 0.3026, 0.0718, and 0.0442, respectively, and also significant. With respect to seed and irrigation, it was found to be insignificant with negative values of 0.0045 and 0.0007. It indicates that per hectare yield of onion decreases if the amount of seed and irrigation hour increase. The coefficients of age, experience, and farm size were significant with expected negative signs, which means that the inefficiency effects in onion production decreases with increase in age, experience, and farm size. The technical efficiency of onion farms varied from 58% to 99% with mean value of 83%. It denotes that there is a scope to increase output per hectare of onion farm by 17% through the efficient use of production  technology without incurring any additional costs. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3329/bjar.v37i1.11191 Bangladesh J. Agril. Res. 37(1): 171-178, March 2012  


2021 ◽  
pp. 101852912110652
Author(s):  
Mercy Ebere Ndubueze-Ogaraku ◽  
Anil Graves

Agricultural productivity in Africa is the lowest in the world with many households not being able to feed themselves. In Africa, women play a major role in agriculture sector constituting about 70–80 per cent of the labour force there. Regrettably, their farm productivity is relatively low mainly due to their inefficient use of farm inputs, which has a serious implication for their socio-economic condition as well as health and nutrition status. With this backdrop in mind, the study investigated the technical efficiency (TE) of the female crop farmers in Niger Delta, Nigeria. Stochastic production frontier approach and ANOVA models were applied to analyse the primary data collected on the 216 female farmers randomly selected from 18 communities of the 3 states in the Delta. It has been found that the farm size and the quantity of labour positively influence TE of these farmers. However, farmer’s age shows a negative sign implying a decrease in technical inefficiency in age whereas the years of schooling shows a positive sign implying an increase in inefficiency with schooling thereby a resulting decrease in TE with schooling. Farm efficiency level in Delta and Akwa Ibom States was not significantly different. However, TE level in both Delta and Akwa Ibom States was significantly different from Rivers State. Since, the age of farmers showed positive influence on TE, farmers should form group and organise regular meetings to enable share knowledge and experiences on the efficient use of farm resources in the Niger Delta Region, Nigeria.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 1132
Author(s):  
Gabriel A. Sampaio Morais ◽  
Felipe F. Silva ◽  
Carlos Otávio de Freitas ◽  
Marcelo José Braga

In developing countries, irrigation can help to decrease poverty in rural areas through increased employment in the agricultural sector. Evidence shows that irrigation may increase farm productivity and technical efficiency. In this paper, we estimate the effect of irrigation on farm technical efficiency in Brazil using the 2006 Agricultural Census dataset on more than 4 million farms. We estimate a stochastic production frontier at farm level, considering potential selection bias in irrigation adoption. We find that farms using irrigation are on average 2.51% more technically efficient compared to rain-fed farms. Our findings also suggest that while small farms are more efficient than medium and large farms, the largest difference in technical efficiency between rain-fed and irrigated farms is among large farms. Our results indicate that policies that seek to support expansion of irrigation adoption has also the potential to achieve greater rural development given the estimated effects estimated in this paper among very small and small farms, which are more than 70% of the farms in Brazil.


Author(s):  
Carlos Otavio de Freitas ◽  
Felipe de Figueiredo Silva ◽  
Marcelo Jose Braga ◽  
Mateus de Carvalho Reis Neves

In this paper, we identify the effect of rural extension on the productive performance of Brazilian agricultural establishments, using technical efficiency as a measure of farm performance. The data used is drawn from the microdata of the 2006 Agricultural Census, accessed directly from the IBGE secrecy room. For this, we use an approach that combines the stochastic production frontier, considering selection bias in the adoption of rural extension (Heckman’s approach) and entropy balancing. We find that rural extension increases efficiency in the use of the productive inputs, with more technical efficiency found among adopting producers than non-adopters. When considering the differences according to farm size, an even greater effect is observed for larger producers. In addition, public rural extension generates higher technical efficiency scores than those obtained by privately-operated establishments.


2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (02) ◽  
pp. 58-63
Author(s):  
MUYIWA SUNDAY OLATIDOYE ◽  
TAIWO ALIMI ◽  
ADEBAYO AKINBOYE AKINOLA

Abstract. Olatidoye MS, Alimi T, Akinola AA. 2018. Quality assessment of the physico-chemical properties of vermiwash produced from different sources during successive storage periods. Asian J Agric 2: 58-63. The study investigated on socio-economic factors and estimated the technical efficiency indices and factors influencing technical efficiency of the sampled cotton farmers in the Southern Cotton growing zone of Nigeria. A multistage sampling technique was employed to select a total sample of 300 cotton farmers. The study made use of only primary data which was collected through the aid of a well-structured questionnaire. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and stochastic frontier production parametric model. The results of the descriptive statistics showed that majority (83%) of the cotton farmers in the study area were males while the mean age of the respondents was 49 years. The average household size was 8 persons per household and majority (69%) of the respondents had formal education. Majority of the respondents (59%) had no access to credit facilities while majority (80.4%) of the cotton farmers had reasonable years of experience ranging between 11 and above in cotton production. Furthermore, the study found that the technical efficiency of the farmers range from 0.35 and 0.99 with a mean of 0.79. This indicates ample opportunity for farmers to increase their productivity through improvement in their technical efficiency. Seed, fertilizer, pesticides and farm size were found to be statistically significant and positively related to farmers’ output while education, credit, extension contact and farming experience of the respondents negatively influenced farmers’ technical inefficiency. The farmers therefore need to increase their output through more intensive use of seed, land, pesticides and fertilizers.


2017 ◽  
Vol 11 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 35-43 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gideon Danso-Abbeam ◽  
Brightina A.A. Abban ◽  
Samuel A. Donkoh

The study aimed at investigating the effects of off-farm participation on technical efficiency of maize production in the Tolon district of the Northern Region, Ghana. The Logit regression model was used to analyze the determinants of off-farm participation while the stochastic frontier production function was used to model the determinants of maize output and technical efficiency. The empirical results from the logistic regression model indicate that age of farmer, educational attainment, farming experience, farm size, and previous farm income are significant drivers of farmers’ participation in off-farm activities. Farmers’ average technical efficiency level was 90.7% suggesting a 9.3% potential loss to inefficiency. Moreover, participation in off-farm activities had a negative influence on farmers’ technical efficiency level. The study, therefore, recommends that farm-level policy should be directed towards making the agricultural sector attractive by promoting investment and agricultural employment opportunities in the rural areas so as to ensure full commitment to farming activities. JEL code: Q22


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tigabu Dagnew Koye ◽  
Abebe Dagnew Koye ◽  
Taye Melese Mekie

Abstract Ethiopia is a country with a total population of more than 110 million, of which about 80% of the total population is engaged in subsistence farming in rural areas. Although agricultural sector plays a great role in Ethiopian economy, it is characterized by low productivity due to technological and socioeconomic factors. Improving smallholder irrigated tomato production, and productivity, would contribute to enhancing food security and alleviating poverty. Therefore, this study was investigated to fill this gap with the aim of analyzing technical efficiency of irrigated tomato production and its determinant factors in North Gondar Zone, Amhara Regional State, Ethiopia. Primary data were collected from 160 farmers’ selected using multistage sampling procedure and analyzed using descriptive statistics, a parametric stochastic frontier production function models. The stochastic frontier and Cobb-Douglas functional form with a one-step approach was employed to analyze efficiency and factors affecting efficiency in irrigated tomato production. The estimated gamma parameters indicated that 80% of the total variation in tomato output was due to technical inefficiency. The means technical efficiency was found 55%, and about 6,907.32 kg of tomato output per hectare was lost due to inefficiency factors implying there is a room for improvement in technical efficiency by 43% with the present technology. The Stochastic Production Frontier (SPF) result revealed that ODE, DAP and plot size at 1% and labor at 10% probability level significantly influencing tomato production. The socio-economic variables that exercised important role for variations in technical efficiency positively were the level of education, TLU and watering in morning, and in contrast age, off farm, watering frequency and training for marketing were found to increase inefficiency significantly among farm households. To get better farmers' efficiency in the production of irrigated tomato a continuous marketing training should be established and strengthening the available farmers training center (FTC) to improve farm productivity. The government and any concerned bodies should be build irrigation canals and other alternatives so as to reduce watering frequency. There should be timely and sufficient supply of DAP to improve farmers’ efficiency in production of tomato.


2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Paul Jr. Tabe-Ojong ◽  
Ernest L. Molua

Agriculture is the mainstay of Cameroon’s economy as it serves the purposes of food, livelihood and employment. Nevertheless, the country’s agriculture is plagued by low productivity and inefficiency in production. One of the main reasons for low productivity is the inability of farmers to fully exploit available technologies and production techniques. An important research question that comes to mind is, what are the major factors that hinder the technical efficiency of smallholder farmers? This study thus aimed to determine the level of technical efficiency in the production of tomato in smallholder farms, relying on primary data collected using a structured survey instrument administered to 80 tomato farmers in the Buea municipality of Cameroon. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and a stochastic frontier analysis method in the Cobb-Douglas production function. The STATA.14 software was used to obtain both stochastic frontier estimates and the determinants of technical efficiency. The results indicate that farmers are not fully technically efficient with a mean technical efficiency score of 0.68 with one farmer operating on the frontier. The study also revealed that most of the farmers irrespective of the size of the holdings have shown technical inefficiency problems. The older farmers were observed with the best measures of technical efficiency. Education, age and the adoption and practice of agronomic techniques had a positive and significant influence on technical efficiency while the nearest distance to the extension agent had a rather negative influence on technical efficiency. The input-output relationship showed that the area of tomato cultivation and the quantity of improved seed used were positive and significantly related to output at the 5% level of probability. As a result, it is recommended that farmers should increase their farm size, use of improved seeds and the adoption and practice of novel techniques in production. More emphasis should be placed on extension agents as they have a significant role to play in terms of improving and augmenting farmers’ education and information base through on farm demonstrations and result oriented workshops as all this will ensure increased production and productivity thereby increasing technical efficiency and achieving food self-sufficiency.


Author(s):  
Mukole Kongolo

This study measured technical efficiency and its determinants in maize production by small-scale producers in Mwanza region, using a stochastic frontier production function approach. A randomly selected sample of participants in the two districts was used. The Maximum Likelihood estimation procedure was followed to obtain the determinants of technical efficiency and technical efficiency levels of small-scale maize producers. The minimum and maximum values of technical efficiency were between 20% and 91%, indicating that the least practices of specific producer operates at a minimum level of 20%, while the best practice producers  operate  at 91% technical efficiency  level respectively. The summary results of the mean technical efficiency was 63%. The main determinants of technical efficiency were labour, farm size, producer’s experience, producer’s age, family size which were all positive and statistically significant. The findings suggest that the average efficiency of small-scale maize producers could be improved by 37% through better use of existing resources and technology. These findings highlight the need for action by government to assist small-scale maize producers improve efficiency.


Author(s):  
Fariha Farjana ◽  
Afia Khatun

The paper concentrates on the measurement of the total factor productivity of dairy farms in the south-west region of Bangladesh. The study used stochastic frontier approach for analyzing the technical efficiency of the dairy farms. Here, seventy dairy farms are considered as a sample. The data reveals that the number of labor and the quantity of food are statistically significant at a 1 percent level of significance.The data also manifests that numerous farm-specific characteristics, i.e. farm size, farmer’s age, and amount of credit are statistically significant at 1 percent, 10 percent, and 10 percent respectively. The range of technical efficiency for the farms varies from 26 percent (minimum) to 95 percent (maximum) where the mean value is 68 percent for the dairy farms of the south-west region. This implies that an average output of milk production falls 32 percent short of maximum possible level. Hence, there is scope of improvement in this sector. Therefore, to improve the farm productivity government should provide proper training, and medical treatment facilities for the farms so that the animals become healthy. If it is possible to do so then the farm level production frontier will shift upward.


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