Publication: Do Farmers Choose to Be Inefficient? Evidence from Bicol
Abstract
Farming households that differ in their ability or willingness to take on risks are likely to allocate resources and effort among income producing activities differently with consequences for productivity. In this paper we measure voluntary and involuntary departures from efficiency for rice producing households in the Bicol region of the Philippines. We take advantage of a panel of observations on households from 1978, 1983 and 1994. Available monthly weather data and survey information on planting times allows us to create household specific measures of weather shocks, which we use in our analysis. We find evidence that diversification and input choices do affect efficiency outcomes among farmers, although these effects are not dominant; accumulated wealth, past decisions to invest, favorable market conditions, and propitious weather are also important determinants of efficiency outcomes among Bicol rice farmers. Our findings suggest that the costs of incomplete formal and informal insurance markets are higher for poorer farmers.
Link to Data Set
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Citations
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Do Farmers Choose to Be Inefficient? Evidence from Bicol, Philippines(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2002-02)Farming households that differ in their ability, or willingness to take on risks are likely to make different decisions when allocating resources, and effort among income-producing activities, with consequences for productivity. The authors measure voluntary, and involuntary departures from efficiency for rice-producing households in Bicol, Philippines. They take advantage of a panel of household observations from 1978, 1983, and 1994. The unusually long-time span of the panel provides ample opportunities for the surveyed households to learn, and apply successful available technologies. The authors find evidence that diversification, and technology choices do effect outcomes among farmers, although these effects are not dominant. Accumulated wealth, past decisions to invest in education, favorable market conditions, and propitious weather are also important determinants of efficiency outcomes among Bicol rice farmers.Publication Urban Proximity, Agricultural Potential and Rural Non-farm Employment: Evidence from Bangladesh(2009)This paper presents empirical evidence on the relative importance of farm and urban linkages for rural non-farm employment in Bangladesh. The results suggest that people are more likely to be employed in well-paid wage employment and self-employment in the non-farm sector if they are closer to urban centers. Those who are further away from such centers are even less likely to be in well-paying non-farm jobs if they are living in areas with greater agricultural potential. The empirical results highlight the need for improved connectivity of regions with higher agricultural potential to urban centers for non-farm development in Bangladesh.Publication Information, Direct Access to Farmers, and Rural Market Performance in Central India(2010)This paper estimates the impact of a change in procurement strategy of a private buyer in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Beginning in October 2000, Internet kiosks and warehouses were established that provide wholesale price information and an alternative marketing channel to soy farmers in the state. Using a new market-level dataset, the estimates suggest a significant increase in soy price after the introduction of kiosks, supporting the predictions of the theoretical model. Moreover, there is a robust increase in area under soy cultivation. The results point toward an improvement in the functioning of rural agricultural markets.Publication Globalization and Smallholders : The Adoption, Diffusion, and Welfare Impact of Non-traditional Export Crops in Guatemala(2010)This paper uses a duration analysis based on adoption data spanning 25 years from six communities in the Central Highlands of Guatemala to explore how household characteristics and external trends play into both the adoption and diffusion processes of non-traditional exports (NTX) among smallholders. Based on the analysis, NTX production appeared to have delivered less prosperity to adopters than initially promised. Smallholders may lack capacity to overcome difficulties that inevitably arise in complex types of cultivations and in highly variable global agricultural markets. Governmental and non-governmental organizations can attempt to mitigate these difficulties, but market forces may overwhelm these efforts.Publication Modelling the Crop Variety Demand of Semi-subsistence Households: Bananas in Uganda(2008)We propose an approach to model the derived demand for crop varieties among semi-subsistence farmers in a developing economy, and apply it to smallholder banana producers in Uganda. We model variety planting decisions as being composed of an extensive margin decision to grow a subset of locally available varieties (variety choice); and an intensive margin decision about the scale or extent of variety cultivation per farm (variety demand). We estimate variety demand equations using a more complete representation of the choice set upon which observed planting decisions are made. Computed elasticities of variety demand with respect to variety attributes indicate that the relative importance of consumption and production attributes varies by location and proximity to markets, from which we draw implications for the social and economic impact of crop improvement. The approach that we propose has broad appeal for analysing adoption decisions for modern or traditional varieties of both major and minor crops in developing countries.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
No results found.