Determinants of adoption of multiple sustainable agricultural practices among smallholder farmers in Nigeria

Publication history: Accepted - 28 October 2020; Published online - 3 November 2020.Despite the important roles of Sustainable Agricultural Practices (SAPs) in improving productivity, welfare, and food security of farming households, the adoption rates of SAPs have been perceived to be generally low, especially in developing countries. Using cross-sectional data collected from the 2015 Nigeria General Household Survey, this study examines the factors influencing the adoption of multiple SAPs, while also considering the drivers of the intensity of adoption of these practices. The methods of data analysis are based on the Multivariate probit and the Ordered probit models. The SAPs considered include improved seeds, inorganic fertilizer, mixed-cropping techniques, and organic manure. The empirical results show that farmers’ adoption of different SAPs and their intensity of use depend significantly on factors such as the age of household head, gender, education, household size, access to extension services, and household wealth status. Our findings imply that policymakers and agricultural development agencies should seek to maintain or increase household asset bases, and encourage both formal and informal training programme among farming households to facilitate the adoption of SAPs

Unpacking Total Factor Productivity on Dairy Farms using Empirical Evidence

Publication history: Accepted - 31 January 2022; Published online - 4 February 2022This study examines the farm-level factors that influence differences in total factor productivity (TFP) on dairy farms. To this end, a fixed-effects regression approach is applied to panel data for dairy farms obtained from the Farm Accountancy Data Network for Northern Ireland over the period of 2005 to 2016. The findings are largely consistent with existing empirical evidence, showing that herd size, milk yield, stocking density, and share of hired labour have a positive and statistically significant impact on TFP, while labour input per cow, purchased feed input per cow, and share of direct payments in total farm output have a negative and statistically significant impact. The more complex relationships, namely age, education, and investment, have been unpacked using interaction terms and nonlinear approximation. The impact of age is negative, and the drag on productivity grows as age increases. Capital investment and education both have a positive impact on farm-level TFP, as well as on their interaction. Policy recommendations on strategies and best practices to help dairy farms tackle productivity constraints are suggestedThis research was undertaken as part of the Northern Ireland Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs Evidence and Innovation Programme [E&I 17/2/04—Productivity growth in the Dairy sector in Northern Ireland: Trends and drivers]

Governance quality, remittances and their implications for food and nutrition security in Sub-Saharan Africa

Despite impressive progress in the fight against malnutrition and hunger in recent years, food and nutrition insecurity remains a major concern in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) countries. In this study, we employ a panel data covering 15 SSA countries from 1996 to 2015 to investigate the growth effects of remittances and quality of governance on food and nutrition security, proxied by the average value of food production and the average dietary energy supply adequacy, respectively. We use a dynamic empirical model based on system GMM to control for unobserved heterogeneity and potential endogeneity of the explanatory variables. The empirical results emanating from our analysis show that the interaction of remittances and the composite index of governance quality exerts positive and significant effects on the average value of food production, and also contributes to the improvement of average dietary energy supply adequacy in SSA. In addition, the control of corruption, government effectiveness, political stability and rule of law scores increase both measures of food and nutrition security. Albeit, the contribution of control over corruption score is relatively the largest as compared to other indicators of governance

Welfare Impact of Globalization in Developing Countries: Examining the Mediating Role of Human Capital

Publication history: Accepted - 16 August 2019, Published - 21. August 2019espite remarkable progress in the fight against poverty during the past few decades, the proportion of the poor living in developing countries is still on the high side. Many countries have promoted integration as an important development strategy; however, its impact on welfare of the poor is still unclear. In this study, we examine the roles of education and health dimensions of human capital in globalization and its impact on the poverty gap and the child mortality rate using cross-country panel data covering 110 developing countries between 1970 and 2015. We use a model based on system generalized method of moments (SGMM) to control for unobserved heterogeneity and potential endogeneity of the explanatory variables. The empirical results reveal that globalization reduces poverty gap and child mortality rate, and that an increase in the stock of human capital in developing economies improves welfare outcomes. The study also finds that human capital strengthens the negative impact of globalization on poverty gap and child mortality rate. For example, should enrollment in secondary school in Nigeria (in 2013) be increased from 39.2% to 61.6%, on average, it could translate into 2508 fewer under-five child deaths. We recommend that interconnectedness and promotion of human capital development should constitute a fundamental component of policy mix targeted at enhancing reduction of poverty and child mortality rate in developing countries

What Drives Households’ Payment forWaste Disposal and Recycling Behaviours? Empirical Evidence from South Africa’s General Household Survey

Publication history: Accepted - 22 July 2020; Published - 1 October 2020.Safeguarding the environment and its citizens’ health remains one of the key policy priorities of the governments of many developing and emerging countries. Using the 2017 General Household Survey (GHS) dataset, this study examines the driving factors a ecting households’ recycling behaviour and payment for waste disposal in South Africa. The methods of data analysis were based on descriptive statistics and a Bivariate Probit regression model. The descriptive statistics results indicate that there are 56.29% male-headed and 43.71% female headed households, with an average age of 49 years. In addition, the study shows that 89.97% of household heads had formal education with a mean monthly income of 11,099.07 ZAR/650.504 USD. The study also revealed that 22% of the households sampled had access to social grants. The results from the Bivariate Probit regression model show that household’s income, access to social grants, formal educational attainment and the age of the household were significant (p < 0.01) driving factors a ecting households’ recycling behaviour and payment for waste disposal. The study concludes that the households’ socio-economic factors a ect their recycling behaviour and willingness to pay for waste management in South Africa. Actions targeted at poverty alleviation and environmental sensitization programmes are key for facilitating environmental conservation behaviours of households in South Africa in order to achieve the environmental sustainability Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target of the United Nations

Does agricultural cooperative membership impact technical efficiency of maize production in Nigeria: An analysis correcting for biases from observed and unobserved attributes

Publication history: Accepted - 31 December 2020; Published online - 22 January 2021The formation of agricultural cooperatives has been widely promoted as an agricultural development policy initiative to help smallholder farmers cope with multiple production and marketing challenges. Using a nationally representative survey dataset of smallholder maize producers from rural Nigeria, this study assesses the impact of agricultural cooperative membership on technical efficiency (TE). We based our estimation approach on the combination of a newly developed sample selection stochastic production frontier model with propensity score matching to control for possible selectivity biases from both observables and unobservables. We estimate stochastic meta-frontiers to examine TE differences between cooperative members and non-members. Our results reveal that TE levels of members are consistently higher than that of non-members. This calls for continued policy incentives targeted at encouraging farmers to form as well as participate in agricultural cooperatives

Welfare Impact of Globalization in Developing Countries: Examining the Mediating Role of Human Capital

Despite remarkable progress in the fight against poverty during the past few decades, the proportion of the poor living in developing countries is still on the high side. Many countries have promoted integration as an important development strategy; however, its impact on welfare of the poor is still unclear. In this study, we examine the roles of education and health dimensions of human capital in globalization and its impact on the poverty gap and the child mortality rate using cross-country panel data covering 110 developing countries between 1970 and 2015. We use a model based on system generalized method of moments (SGMM) to control for unobserved heterogeneity and potential endogeneity of the explanatory variables. The empirical results reveal that globalization reduces poverty gap and child mortality rate, and that an increase in the stock of human capital in developing economies improves welfare outcomes. The study also finds that human capital strengthens the negative impact of globalization on poverty gap and child mortality rate. For example, should enrollment in secondary school in Nigeria (in 2013) be increased from 39.2% to 61.6%, on average, it could translate into 2508 fewer under-five child deaths. We recommend that interconnectedness and promotion of human capital development should constitute a fundamental component of policy mix targeted at enhancing reduction of poverty and child mortality rate in developing countries

Unpacking Total Factor Productivity on Dairy Farms Using Empirical Evidence

This study examines the farm-level factors that influence differences in total factor productivity (TFP) on dairy farms. To this end, a fixed-effects regression approach is applied to panel data for dairy farms obtained from the Farm Accountancy Data Network for Northern Ireland over the period of 2005 to 2016. The findings are largely consistent with existing empirical evidence, showing that herd size, milk yield, stocking density, and share of hired labour have a positive and statistically significant impact on TFP, while labour input per cow, purchased feed input per cow, and share of direct payments in total farm output have a negative and statistically significant impact. The more complex relationships, namely age, education, and investment, have been unpacked using interaction terms and nonlinear approximation. The impact of age is negative, and the drag on productivity grows as age increases. Capital investment and education both have a positive impact on farm-level TFP, as well as on their interaction. Policy recommendations on strategies and best practices to help dairy farms tackle productivity constraints are suggested

Modelling the Impact of Decoupled Payments on Farm Production

The distorting effect of agricultural subsidies on production decisions has been a major topic of debate in agricultural policy analysis for several decades. In light of the 2003 and the 2013 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reforms in the EU which delinked payments from current production, this paper examines the impact of decoupled payments on farm production in Northern Ireland using a farm-level panel dataset for the 2008 – 2016 period. An instrumental variable fixed effect model is employed, which allows important sources of endogeneity to be controlled for. Empirical results reveal that decoupled payments had significant positive effects on production outcomes but with differential impacts across sectors. The findings suggest that decoupled payments still maintain a significant effect on agricultural production. One likely explanation for this is that farmers may still be using decoupled payments to partly subsidise unprofitable farm production

Dynamic Relationships among Phosphate Rock, Fertilisers and Agricultural Commodity Markets: Evidence from a Vector Error Correction Model and Directed Acyclic Graphs

Publication history: Accepted - 13 August 2021; Published online - 24 August 2021.The finite supply of phosphate rock, as well as rising fertiliser prices, are key topics in the discussion around global food system resilience. Our paper contributes to this discussion by conducting an analysis of the dynamic causal relationships between phosphate rock, fertilisers, and wheat prices to provide insights on how farmers and policymakers might respond to phosphate rock supply shocks for sustainable and resilient food systems. The linkages between 147 monthly price observations spanning from March 2007 to April 2019 were analysed by combining Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAG), a recently developed modelling technique, and a Vector Error Correction Model (VECM). The findings suggest that there are five long-run cointegrating relationships between these three key components of the food supply chain. Price shocks to the phosphate rock market, over a two-year period had a knock-on positive impact on phosphorus fertiliser prices and to a lesser extent on wheat prices. Interestingly, an increase in wheat price had a sizeable impact on both fertiliser and phosphate rock prices, providing empirical evidence that increases in the price of phosphate rock are driven by demand factors, as well as supply factors.The study was conducted as part of the RePhoKus project “The role of Phosphorus in the Resilience and Sustainability of the UK food system” funded by the the Global Food Security's ‘Resilience of the UK Food System Programme’ with the UK's Biotechnology and Biological Science Research Council (BBSRC), the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), and the Scottish Government (Grant No. BB/R005842/1)