Other Agriculture Study
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Publication
Myanmar: Analysis of Farm Production Economics
(World Bank, Yangon, 2016-02-26)This report was prepared by the World Bank in partnership with the Livelihoods and Food Security Multi-Donor Trust Fund (LIFT). Both the World Bank and the LIFT are actively involved in supporting Myanmar’s agriculture sector given its significance in poverty reduction and food security, and they both consider the lack of reliable farm data to be a significant constraint to designing effective programs and policies. This report fills some of the data gaps. In addition to presenting the collected data, the report offers the first analysis of these data. It focuses on the assessment of the extent of crop diversification and an analysis of farm production economics, in particular (partial factor) productivity of agricultural land and labor and crop profitability. This focus was chosen to study Myanmar’s commercial production areas and to facilitate international comparisons, as most international studies follow a similar approach, focusing on advanced farmers in commercial production areas. The four main findings of the report are as follows: (i) Myanmar’s farming systems are diversified and during the monsoon season most farms produce paddy, during the cool and dry seasons most farms produce crops other than paddy, mainly beans and pulses, oilseeds, and maize; (ii) the analysis reconfirmed that agricultural productivity in Myanmar is low, irrespective of what indicators are used, limiting the sector’s contribution to poverty reduction and shared prosperity; (iii) low productivity is a result of multiple factors, many of them associated with the undersupply of quality public services such as research, extension, and rural infrastructure, in delivery of which the government has a key role to play; and (iv) going forward and given that paddy is less profitable and more costly to produce than other crops in most agro-ecological zones, especially during the cool and dry seasons, it is desirable to redesign public programs from exclusive support of paddy production to support for broad-based agricultural development. -
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Myanmar : Rice Price Reduction and Poverty Reduction
(Washington, DC, 2014-10-04)Myanmar is a low-income agrarian country with a high poverty rate. The livelihood of many poor people depends on the performance of agriculture, especially the rice sector. Rice accounts for 70 percent of Myanmar s total cultivated area and 30 percent of the value of its agricultural production. Increasing returns to rice production will be the key to increasing farm wages and incomes in the short to medium run. Higher rice production will also help maintain low food prices, improve food security, and reduce poverty, as an average household spends 61 percent of total household income on food, and rice is a major component of the food basket. Price fluctuations are a common feature of well-functioning agricultural markets. Price fluctuation should be expected in such markets, since output varies from period to period due to factors such as weather, pests and disease, and because demand and supply are inelastic in the short run. Moreover, some amount of seasonal and spatial price movements should be tolerated, since these usefully signal scarcity in the market and facilitate a supply response, foster arbitrage between surplus and deficit regions, as well as guide post-harvest handling, storage and trade decisions. However, in the case of Myanmar s rice market, several factors serve to exacerbate price fluctuation and make them more pronounced and unpredictable (volatile) and lead to serious negative impacts for consumers and farmers. Rice price volatility is of concern to the Myanmar government given the high importance of rice for farm incomes and consumer expenditures, and thereby for food security and poverty reduction. On the production side, prices volatility inhibits farmers supply response and is a disincentive for greater use of purchased inputs and increased investments. Volatility can also discourage rice-producing farmers to diversify their cropping patterns to high-value crops if they cannot buy cereals for consumption at more predictable prices. On the consumption side, rice price spikes can cause increased food insecurity for those not wealthy enough to maintain consumption levels at the higher prices. For people spending 50 percent of their income on rice, a 20 percent temporary increase in rice prices would lead to an approximate 10 percent decline in effective income. This is a large shock, often equivalent to households spending on health and education. -
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Myanmar : Capitalizing on Rice Export Opportunities
(Bangkok, 2014-02-28)Improving agricultural productivity and promoting exports are top priorities for the Government of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar. Given the centrality of rice to the rejuvenation of agriculture in Myanmar, the rice sector is of critical importance, especially rice exports. The government announced ambitious targets of 2 million metric tons (tons)2 of rice exports by 2014/15 and 4 million tons by 2019/20. Recent actual performance is falling short of these targets, but the opening of Myanmar's economy has already helped significantly increase rice exports. The rest of the report is organized as follows. Chapter two provides information on recent rice export developments in Myanmar. Chapter three presents the evolving export opportunities as well as challenges that must be overcome to capitalize on them. Chapter four describes the main constraints at various segments of the value chain and offers possible remedies. Chapter five discusses how rice policy should evolve to support modernization of the rice value chain. Chapter six offers conclusions and policy recommendations. Seven annexes provide further, more detailed information. -
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Estimates of Domestic Resource Cost in Philippines Agriculture
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-01)This study is part of a World Bank review of major issues in agribusiness in the Philippines that aims at (i) strengthening the analytical underpinnings of the current and future portfolio of operations of the Bank in the Agriculture and Rural Development (ARD) sector of the Philippines, consolidating analytical work carried out in the past two to three years and provide critical inputs for project design; and (ii) building capacities and developing a common understanding and platform with counterparts on how the results of this analysis could inform future policies and programs in the agriculture and agribusiness sector of the Philippines. The study updates the last round of domestic resource cost (DRC) estimations done by Gergely (2010), and continues work done on agricultural policy indicators for the Philippines. The rest of this report is organized as follows: the methodology for DRC analysis is presented in Section 2. A review of commodity profiles and past estimates is provided in Section 3. Section 4 presents the results and analysis of applying the DRC method. Section 5 summarizes and makes recommendations. -
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Support for Agricultural Restructuring Project : The Financial and Economic Competitiveness of Rice and Selected Feed Crops in Northern and Southern Vietnam
(Washington, DC, 2013-01)One area of weakness in current agricultural policy work in Vietnam is the lack of a clear understanding of both the private profitability of farmers for different crop activities and the social profitability of such activities. Agricultural performance is thus gauged in physical terms (i.e. yields and the volume of aggregate output) rather than in financial or economic terms. This has hampered efforts to compare and contrast the impacts and effectiveness of alternative policy and program measures. Comparative metrics for different crops and farm management systems have been lacking. The main objectives of this paper are: (i) to describe the Policy Analysis Matrix (PAM) methodology and how to interpret key financial and economic indicators; (ii) to document the underlying assumptions used for the analysis; and (iii) to provide a summary and brief interpretation of the main quantitative results and outcome of selected sensitivity tests. As a step towards improved sector planning, this paper utilizes the PAM to analyze various farm management systems for rice, maize, and cassava in different parts of Vietnam. Tradeoffs are involved in all production decisions and the PAM provides a systematic way of comparing the private and underlying social costs and returns from different agriculture enterprises together with the effects of government policy. The paper is presented in following five sections: section one is introduction; section two describes the methodology and main assumptions used for the analysis; section three presents the main quantitative results for different kinds of rice grown for export in An Giang province in the Mekong delta of southern Vietnam and for domestic rice and alternative stock feed crops grown in northern Vietnam; section four presents the results of various sensitivity tests that looked at the impact of changes in crop yields, commodity prices, fertilizer costs, and labor costs; and section five concludes with a summary of key findings and policy recommendations. -
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Mongolia : Improving Feed and Fodder Supply for Dzud Management
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2011-06)The paper reports on improving feed and fodder supply for the dzud management in Mongolia study, and aims to identify policy options that could improve the effectiveness and efficiency of dzud emergency management and response. It includes an assessment of the appropriate roles for the private and public sectors, identification of issues, and capacity building requirements. The study will support a policy dialogue and could provide the foundation for a longer-term pilot project in feed and fodder production, storage, and distribution, as part a coherent and effective emergency strategy. -
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Strengthening the Performance of Samoa's Fruit and Vegetable Sector
(Washington, DC, 2011)Numerous opportunities exist to improve the performance of Samoa's fresh fruit and vegetable (F&V) sector. Current per capita consumption appears to be low by regional and global standards indicating prospects for future demand growth and a need for increased awareness of the dietary benefits of fruit and vegetable consumption. A large share of the existing demand for fruits and vegetables is being met by imports and there appears to be scope for encouraging domestic production to reduce Samoa's import dependence. The presence of well-organized retail and foodservice channels represent a considerable advantage to an organized fresh produce supply chain, provided that domestic producers are able to meet buyer standards for product continuity, quality and price. There are several products which could also be developed into sustainable export commodities. A range of on-farm investments, training, organizational and research priorities have been identified to enable the F&V sub-sector to respond to these potential market opportunities. Following an appraisal of opportunities and an analysis of value chains for representative commodities which might be grown in response to demand from the local market, the report recommends a series of proposed actions to strengthen the performance of the fruit and vegetable sub-sector in Samoa. -
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Developing the Organic Agriculture Sub-Sector in Samoa
(Washington, DC, 2010-11-01)The World Bank has provided technical assistance (TA) support to the Government of Samoa to help identify measures to strengthen agriculture sector institutions, to improve the performance of selected commodities - including livestock, fruits and vegetables and organic products - and to identify strategic agriculture infrastructure investments. This report provides information and analysis on opportunities for further development of organic products. The report also contains recommendations for activities that could be potentially supported as part of the proposed Samoa Agriculture Competiveness Enhancement Project (SACEP). This TA has identified a number of interventions to support further development of Samoan organic products. These include promoting domestic-oriented organic production targeted at the hospitality industry; support for up-grading and expanding existing value chains for export-oriented products including Misiluki bananas, coconut oil and products made from coconut oil; and investments in improved technology, better facilities, trial processing, and trial shipments to new destinations. -
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Mongolia : Livestock Sector Study
(Washington, DC, 2009-09-15)The purpose of this synthesis report is to try and draw together recent work on the sector to understand in greater detail what is driving the sector, and how these drivers and trends may play out in the future and what options are available in response. This is not a strategy for the sector, but rather an attempt to provide some clarity to the development of the sector as a basis for stimulating discussion to inform strategy and specifically, to inform government policy and expenditure in the sector. The report draws upon five working papers (WPs) that were commissioned by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture in 2006 and 2007 . These papers tried to fill gaps in current knowledge of drivers in the sector rather than provide a comprehensive study of the sector, and their findings have been supplemented by other work in the sector.