Farm Technologies and Production Risk in the Face of Climate Change in Tanzania
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.61538/huria.v24i2.486Abstract
In countries where insurance and credit markets are thin or missing, production and consumption risks play a critical role in the choice and use of production inputs and adoption of new farm technologies. This paper investigated the effect of selected farm technologies and their risk implications in different rainfall patterns of Pangani river basin in Tanzania. Given the production risks posed by climate change, such information can be used by decision makers to identify appropriate agricultural practices that act as a buffer against climate change. Using a household and plot-level data set, Just and Pope framework was applied to using a quadratic production function to investigate the impact of selected farm technologies on average crop yields and the variance of crop yields, while controlling for several household and plot level factors. The results revealed that farm technologies perform differently in different rainfall areas, which underscores the importance of careful geographical targeting when promoting and up-scaling farm technologies adoption to climate change.ÂReferences
Agrawala, S., Moehner, A., Hemp, A., Van Aalst, M., Hits, S., Smith, J., Meena, H., Mwakifwamba, S., Hyera, T. and Mwaipopo, O. (2003). Development and Climate Change in Tanzania: Focus on Mount Kilimanjaro. Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Paris. 72pp.
Antle, J. (1983). Testing the Stochastic Structure of Production: A Flexible Moment-Based Approach. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics 1:192-201.
Bezabih, M., Chambwera, M. and Stage, J. (2010). Climate Change, Total Factor Productivity and the Tanzanian Economy: A computable General Equilibrium Analysis. Environment for Development. Discussion paper Series. June 2010, EFD, DP 10-14pp.
Binswanger, H. (1981). Attitudes toward Risk: Theoretical Implications of an Experiment in Rural India. Economic Journal 91(364): 867-890.
Dercon, S. and Christiansen, L. (2007). Consumption Risk, Technology Adoption and Poverty Traps: Evidence from Ethiopia. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 4257. 49pp.
Di Falco, S. Chavas, J. P and Smale, M. (2007) Farmer Management of Production Risk on Degraded Land. The role of Wheat Genetic Diversity in the Tigray Region, Ethiopia. Agricultural Economics 36 (2): 147-156.
Farnsworth, R., and L. J. Moffitt. (1981). Cotton Production under Risk: An Analysis of Input Effects on Yield Variability and Factor Demand. Western Journal of Agricultural Economics 6: 155-163.
Fufa, B and Hassan, R. (2003). Stochastic Maize Production Technology and Production Risk Analysis in Dadar District, East Ethiopia. Agrekon 42 (2), 116-128.
Guttormsen, A., Roll, K. and Asche, F. (2013). Modelling production risk in small scale subsistence agriculture. The Journal of Agricultural Education and Extension 6: 43-86.
Harvey, A. C. (1976). Estimating Regression Models with Multiplicative Heteroscedasticity. Econometrica 44 (3): 461-465.
IPCC, (2013). Annex I: Atlas of Global and Regional Climate Projections. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, 1311-1394pp. IPCC, (2012). Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation. A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [Field, C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin,
D.J. Dokken, K.L. Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K. Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley (Eds.)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, and New York, NY, USA, 582pp.
IUCN, (2003). Pangani basin: A situation analysis. Nairobi, Kenya: IUCN.
The World Conservation Union.
[http://www.iucn.org/themes/wani/pub/SituationPangani.pdf.] site visited 13/4/2016.
IUCN, (2009). The Pangani River Basin: A Situation Analysis, 2nd Edition, 82pp.
Just, R. and Pope, R. (1979). Production Function Estimation and Related Risk Considerations. American Journal of Agricultural Economics 61(2): 276–84.
Just, R., and Pope, R. (1978). Stochastic Representation of Production Functions and Econometric Implications. Journal of Econometrics 7: 67-86.
Kangalawe, R. and Lyimo, J. (2013). Climate Change, Adaptive Strategies and Rural Livelihoods in Semiarid Tanzania. Natural Resources, 4: 266278.
Kassie, M., Yesuf, M. and Köhlin, G. (2008). The Role of Production Risk in Sustainable Land–Management Technology Adoption in the Ethiopian Highlands. RFF Discussion Paper EFD 09-13. Washington, DC. 35pp.
Kassie, M., Zikhali, P., Pender, J., and Kohlin, G. (2010). The economics of sustainable land management practices in the Ethiopian highlands. Journal of Agricultural Economics 61: 605–627.
Kato, E., Ringler, C., Yesuf, M. and Bryan, E. (2009). Soil and water conservation technologies: A buffer against production risk in the
face of climate change? Insights from the Nile basin in Ethiopia. IFPRI Discussion Paper 871. Washington, D.C.: IFPRI.
Kebede, K. and Adenew, B. (2011). Analysis of Technical Efficiency: Lessons and Implications for Wheat Producing Commercial Farms in Ethiopia. Journal of Economics and sustainable Development 2(8): 39-47.
Khanal, A. R., Khadka, K., Poudel, I., Joshi, K. D. and Hollington, P. (2009). Report on farmers’ local knowledge associated with the production, utilization and diversity of ricebean (Vigna umbellata) in Nepal. In: The Ricebean Network: Farmers indigenous knowledge of ricebean in Nepal (report N°4), EC. 6th FP, Project no. 032055, FOSRIN (Food Security through Ricebean Research in India and Nepal).
Kim, N. and Coelli, T. (2009). Quantifying the effects of modelling choices on hospital efficiency measures: A meta-regression analysis CEPA Working Paper Series No. WP07/2009. School of Economics
University of Queensland St. Lucia, Qld. 4072 Australia ISSN No. 1932 – 4398.
Kumbhakar, S. (1993). Production Risk, Technical Efficiency, and Panel Data. Econ. Letters 41,111-16.
Kumbhakar, S., Lien, G. and Hardaker, J. (2011). Technical Efficiency in Competing Panel Data Models: A Study of Norwegian Grain Farming. Paper Presented at the EAAE 2011 Congress: Change and Uncertainty, Challenges for Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources, Aug 30 to Sept 2, 2011, ETH Zurich, Switzerland, 1-12 PP.
Lyimo, S., Mduruma, Z. and De Groote, H. (2014). The use of improved maize varieties in Tanzania. African Journal of Agricultural Research 9(7): 643-657
Ndomba, P. (2010). Development of rainfall curve for crops planting date in
Pangani Basin. Nile Basin water and Science Engineering Journal 3(1): 1327.
Pope, D. and Just. E. (1991). On Testing the Structure of Risk Preference in Agricultural Supply Analysis. American Journal of Agricultural Economics 73 (3): 743–48.
Salami, A., Kamara, B. and Brixiova, Z. (2010). Smallholder Agriculture in East Africa: Trends, Constraints and Opportunities, Working Papers Series No. 105 African Development Bank, Tunis, Tunisia.
Shankar, B., R. Bennet, and S. Morse (2008). ‘‘Production Risk, Pesticide Use and GM Crop Technology in South Africa. Applied Economics 40: 24892500.
Smale, M., Hartell, J., Heisey, P. and Senauer, B. (1998). The Contribution of Genetic Resources and Diversity to Wheat Production in the Punjab of Pakistan. American Journal of Agricultural Economics 80: 482–493.
Thierfelder, C. and Wall, P. (2012). Effects of conservation agriculture on soil quality and productivity in contrasting agro-ecological environments of Zimbabwe. Soil Use and Management 28: 209–220.
URT, (2012). National Sample Census of Small Holder Agriculture Volume Ii: Crop Sector – National Report, Government Printers Dar es salaam.
URT, (2014). Tanzania Agriculture Climate Resilience Plan, 2014–2019.
[http://www.kilimo.go.tz/publications/english%20docs/ACRP_TA NZANIA_ENDORSED.pdf].
URT, (2014). Tanzania Agriculture Climate Resilience Plan, 2014–2019.
[http://www.kilimo.go.tz/publications/english%20docs/ACRP_TA NZANIA_ENDORSED.pdf].
Westengen, O. and Brysting, K. (2014). Crop adaptation to climate change in the semi-arid zone in Tanzania: the role of genetic resources and seed systems. Agriculture and Food Security 3:3.
Wik, M., Kebede, T. A., Bergland, O. and Holden, S. T. (2004). On the measurement of risk aversion from experimental data. Applied
Economics 2: 44 – 45.
Yamane, T. (1967). Statistics: an introductory analysis (3rd Ed.). New York:
Harper and Row Publishers. 607-610pp.