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Farmers’ adoption of multiple climate-smart agricultural technologies in Ghana: determinants and impacts on maize yields and net farm income
This study investigates the factors affecting maize farmers’ decisions to adopt climate-smart agricultural (CSA) technologies and estimates the impacts of CSA technology adoption on maize yields and net farm income. Unlike most previous studies that analyze a single technology, we consider different combinations of three CSA technologies (zero tillage, row planting, and drought-resistant seed). A multinomial endogenous switching regression model addresses selection bias issues arising from observed and unobserved factors and analyses data collected from 3197 smallholder farmers in three Ghana regions (Brong-Ahafo, Northern, and Ashanti). The findings show that smallholder farmers’ decisions to adopt multiple CSA technologies are influenced by farmer-based organization membership, education, resource constraints such as lack of land, access to markets, and production shocks such as perceived pest and disease stress and drought. We also find that adopting all three CSA technologies together has the largest impact on maize yields, while adopting row planting and zero tillage as a combination has the largest impact on net farm income. Governments should collaborate with farmer-based groups and extension officers to improve farmers’ awareness and understanding of the benefits associated with CSA technologies and help them adopt multiple technologies that generate higher benefits.
Journal Article
Climate-smart agriculture: adoption, impacts, and implications for sustainable development
The 19 papers included in this special issue examined the factors influencing the adoption of climate-smart agriculture (CSA) practices among smallholder farmers and estimated the impacts of CSA adoption on farm production, income, and well-being. Key findings from this special issue include: (1) the variables, including age, gender, education, risk perception and preferences, access to credit, farm size, production conditions, off-farm income, and labour allocation, have a mixed (either positive or negative) influence on the adoption of CSA practices; (2) the variables, including labour endowment, land tenure security, access to extension services, agricultural training, membership in farmers’ organizations, support from non-governmental organizations, climate conditions, and access to information consistently have a positive impact on CSA adoption; (3) diverse forms of capital (physical, social, human, financial, natural, and institutional), social responsibility awareness, and digital advisory services can effectively promote CSA adoption; (4) the establishment of climate-smart villages and civil-society organizations enhances CSA adoption by improving their access to credit; (5) CSA adoption contributes to improved farm resilience to climate change and mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions; (6) CSA adoption leads to higher crop yields, increased farm income, and greater economic diversification; (7) integrating CSA technologies into traditional agricultural practices not only boosts economic viability but also contributes to environmental sustainability and health benefits; and (8) there is a critical need for international collaboration in transferring technology for CSA. Overall, the findings of this special issue highlight that through targeted interventions and collaborative efforts, CSA can play a pivotal role in achieving food security, poverty alleviation, and climate resilience in farming communities worldwide and contribute to the achievements of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Journal Article
Factors influencing rural migrant households’ participation in livelihood activities and income diversification strategies in Southwestern Nigeria
This study focuses on factors influencing rural migrant households’ participation in livelihood activities and income diversification strategies in southwest Nigeria. A multistage sampling technique was used for the study. This involved purposive selection of Ekiti, Osun, and Oyo states and twenty percent of the rural Local Government Areas (LGAs) in the respective states. Ten percent of wards in each LGA and 40% of migrant households were randomly selected to arrive at 413 respondents. A structured questionnaire was used to collect relevant data for the study. The collected data were analysed using descriptive statistics, estimation of SID, and multinomial logit regression. The findings showed that 72.75% of household heads were males. 76.75% of the respondents were first-generation migrants, with a mean duration of stay of 29.51 years. The SID revealed that income-generating activities among migrants are moderately (0.53) diversified. The primary factor influencing migrant households’ preference for non-farm and off-farm activities over farm activities was the size of their land holdings. The study recommends that government and other stakeholders should adopt strategy to improve access to non-farm and off-farm employment opportunities, particularly in rural areas, by encouraging corporate and private investors to invest in rural areas to solve the problem of unemployment during off-seasons.
Journal Article
Racial, ethnic and gender inequities in farmland ownership and farming in the U.S
This paper provides an analysis of U.S. farmland owners, operators, and workers by race, ethnicity, and gender. We first review the intersection between racialized and gendered capitalism and farmland ownership and farming in the United States. Then we analyze data from the 2014 Tenure and Ownership Agricultural Land survey, the 2012 Census of Agriculture, and the 2013–2014 National Agricultural Worker Survey to demonstrate that significant nation-wide disparities in farming by race, ethnicity and gender persist in the U.S. In 2012–2014, White people owned 98% and operated 94% of all farmland. They generated 98% of all farm-related income from land ownership and 97% of income from farm owner-operatorship. Meanwhile, People of Color farmers (African American or Black, Asian American, Native American, Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, and Hispanic farmers) were more likely to be tenants rather than owners, owned less land, and generated less farm-related wealth per person than their White counterparts. Hispanic farmers were also disproportionately farm laborers. In addition to racial and ethnic disparities, there were disparities by gender. About 63% of non-operating landowners, 86% of farm operators, and 87% of tenant farmers were male, and female farmers tended to generate less income per farmer than men. This data provides evidence of ongoing racial, ethnic and gender disparities in agriculture in the United States. We conclude with a call to address the structural drivers of the disparities and with recommendations for better data collection.
Journal Article
Economic benefits of climate-smart agricultural practices: empirical investigations and policy implications
Adopting climate-smart agricultural practices (CAPs) has the potential to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change and directly influence the well-being of households. Therefore, this research investigates the impact of CAP adoption intensity on household income, net farm income, and income diversity, using the 2020 China Rural Revitalization Survey data. We utilize the approach of two-stage residual inclusion (2SRI) to mitigate the endogeneity of CAP adoption intensity. The results show that CAP adoption intensity positively and significantly affects household income, net farm income, and income diversity. Heterogeneous analysis indicates that the impacts of CAP adoption intensity on household income increase across the selected quantiles, but the impacts on net farm income decrease across the same. In addition, CAP adoption intensity significantly improves income diversity only at the 20th quantile. Our findings suggest that enhancing farmers’ CAP adoption intensity improves rural household welfare.
Journal Article
Flying over the farm: understanding drone adoption by Australian irrigators
As part of a precision agricultural approach, drones have increasingly been employed within agriculture for more than a decade and are shown to provide many benefits. However, little research to date has been conducted on farmers’ adoption of drones. This study applies probit regression to analyse future plans of irrigators (n = 1000 in 2015–2016) in adopting drone technology in the southern Murray-Darling Basin, Australia. As at 2015–2016, it was found that only 4–8% of irrigators in various agricultural industries had adopted drone technology. However, the results suggested that up to one third of irrigation farmers stated that they planned to use drones in the following five years, with adoption more likely to occur when irrigators are able to achieve tangible benefits, such as labour and water savings. Human, financial and farm capital factors are found to be positively associated with future drone adoption, including higher education, larger farm size, greater application of irrigation water, being a certified organic operator, having a whole of farm plan and having a farm succession plan. However, financial stress from the bank was found to be an adoption barrier, as well as percentage of net farm income and off-farm income—beyond a certain level.
Journal Article
Agricultural Market Liberalization and Household Food Security in Rural China
In the 1990s, prior to its accession to the World Trade Organization, China dramatically reduced market distortions in agriculture. We use a panel of 6,770 rural households from 1989 to 2000 to ask whether agricultural market liberalization affected rural household food security as measured by the share of calories from non-staples. Given that not all households may be able to take advantage of new market opportunities, we focus on the distributional effect of market liberalization. Unlike most previous research on the effects of liberalization, we consider the effects of liberalization on both farm and off-farm income. We find that liberalization primarily improves household food security by increasing off-farm income, and the effects vary greatly by initial food security status and producer types. While many households benefit from liberalization, some food-insecure households producing import-competing products have lower food security as a result of agricultural market liberalization.
Journal Article
Combined effects of fungicides formulations and potato varieties on late blight management, yield and net farm income in Kenya
Management of late blight relies on the use of fungicides and potato varieties which have been associated with loss of efficacy over time. Baseline survey and field studies were conducted to evaluate the effects of fungicide formulations and potato varieties in managing late blight and subsequently on net farm income improvement. Four fungicides formulations (Infinito® (Fluopicolide 62.5g L−1 + propamocarb 625 g L−1), Milraz® (Propineb 700 g kg−1 + cymoxanil 60 g kg−1), Mistress 72® (Mancozeb 640 g kg−1 + cymoxanil 80 g kg−1) and Ridomil® (Metalaxyl 40 g kg−1 + mancozeb 640 g kg−1)), and varieties (Kenya Mpya, Shangi and Dutch Robijn) were evaluated. Survey results revealed that the majority (78%) of the farmers selected varieties to grow based on market dynamics as compared to seed availability (18%), disease resistance (12%) and other factors (8%). The most widely and least used fungicides were Ridomil® (28.8%) and Infinito® (1.7%) respectively. Late blight significantly reduced crop growth (height and stem count) and yield in the unprotected plots in Shangi and Dutch Robijn, but no effect was observed in K. Mpya. Mistress® suppressed blight symptoms by 54%, while Milraz® (lowest effects) reduced the disease by (43%). In unprotected plots, disease severity on K. Mpya was below 1%, while in Shangi and Dutch Robijn varieties, it was 60 and 78% respectively. Reduction in disease by Mistress® resulted in higher yield (30.70 t ha−1) as compared to the unprotected plots (9.25 t ha−1). Maximum yield (28.56 t ha−1) was obtained from K. Mpya, while Dutch Robijn, had the lowest observed yield (20.70 t ha−1) in protected plots. Yet, the highest cost benefit ratio (CBR) was recorded in unprotected plots with K. Mpya. The smallest CBR (1.55) was observed on plots where Milraz® was applied on Dutch Robjn. Results of this study show that, the use of fungicides reduced late blight and improved yield of potato substantially, but the efficacy varied with fungicide formulation and potato variety. However, the use of resistant variety was effective in managing late blight hence a useful tool for minimizing fungicide applications. Therefore, use of resistant variety could enhance a healthy biodiversity and at the same time maximize food production.
Journal Article