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on Efficiency and Productivity |
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Issue of 2018‒09‒24
35 papers chosen by |
| By: | Kamiche Zegarra, J.; Bravo-Ureta, B. |
| Abstract: | This article analyzes how information use affect farm productivity and efficiency. Our hypothesis is that farmers make better decisions when they use information (for example, choosing a high value crop combination or selling the products at higher prices) and that will enhance on productivity and efficiency. We use two techniques to mitigate the possible biases generated by observable and unobservable variables: Propensity Score Matching (PSM) for the first one and the stochastic production function (SPF) approach corrected by sample selection for the second one. We take advantage of the underused Peruvian National Agricultural Survey (ENA) which includes information about 12 877 farmers located in the Andean region. Our results show that farmers who use information are systematically nearer to their frontier than those who do not use information (0.50 vs. 0.47, on average). The analysis by plot size and age suggest that farmers with smaller plots and those who are middle age are more efficient in the users group; however, the relation is not clear among the nonusers of information. Thus, more research is needed about the complementarity of the agricultural inputs and information use. These results can contribute to the design of a cost-effectiveness evaluation of information extension programs. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Marketing |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275870&r=eff |
| By: | Cheng, Shen; Bravo-Ureta, Boris E.; Zheng, Zhihao; Sun, Hao |
| Keywords: | Productivity Analysis, Production Economics, Agricultural and Food Policy |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258533&r=eff |
| By: | Brendan O’Connor |
| Abstract: | Productivity is the ultimate driver of sustainable increases in living standards. While Ireland is a high productivity country, it has not been immune from the global productivity slowdown, with the pace of growth on a downward trend throughout the 2000s. Little research has been carried out as to the determinants behind the productivity slowdown in Ireland, and even less so with microdata. To fill the gap, we use a firm-level panel dataset based on production surveys from Ireland’s national statistics office, together with the OECD MultiProd model, in order to identify productivity patterns and trends distributed by percentile, sector, ownership, as well as measures of the efficiency of resource allocation. Our results show a widening of the productivity gap between the most and least productive firms, with the majority of firms experiencing a decline in productivity since the mid-2000s, and also confirm that aggregate results are driven by the impact of foreign dominated sectors, with foreign firms typically larger and more productive. These results are significant in terms of enterprise policy and featured prominently in the OECD’s 2018 Economic Survey of Ireland. |
| Keywords: | Firm level productivity, labour productivity, multifactor productivity, MultiProd, productivity dispersion, productivity distribution, productivity frontier, resource allocation |
| JEL: | F23 M13 O30 O40 O57 |
| Date: | 2018–09–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:oec:ecoaac:15-en&r=eff |
| By: | Kalibwani, R. |
| Abstract: | This paper provides insight into the relationship between technical efficiency of maize farming and household wealth indicators in Uganda. The study uses national panel data in 2005/06 and 2009/10, and a stochastic frontier production function model is specified for the maize farming households. Up to 2,295 households were found to have grown maize in 2005/06, and 2,343 households in 2009/10 from the data sets. The results show that up to 86% of the maize farming households attained on average low mean efficiency scores below 0.5. While inorganic fertilizer was found to be important in contributing to maize productivity and therefore technical efficiency, the number of households using it between the two time periods was found to reduce albeit not significantly. The number using organic fertilizer though, significantly increased (1%). Household wealth is found to be significantly (1% level) associated with a reduction in technical efficiency. The study recommends interventions targeted at poor rural households to improve maize output markets so as to competitively reward household investment in production, and subsequently generate household wealth. This would make maize production attractive to the producers, motivating them to make necessary investment in inorganic fertilizer and other purchased inputs. |
| Keywords: | Crop Production/Industries, International Development |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275889&r=eff |
| By: | Chebil, A.; Frija, A.; Bennouna, B. |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we assess the effects of water shortage on the competitiveness of major traded commodities in Tunisia. Based on a sample of 170 wheat farms and 51 orange farms, located in the main producing regions of the country, stochastic production frontier functions were used to estimate changes in marginal water value under different levels of water availability. These values are then used as opportunity costs and utilized in the calculation of Domestic Resource Cost (DRC) coefficients. Empirical results show that Tunisia has a comparative advantage (DRC<1) in the production of orange. However, Tunisia exhibited a DRC greater than one for wheat. Results of sensitivity analysis demonstrate the degree of deterioration of competitiveness in wheat and orange production under reduced water availability. At 50% decreases in water availability, DRC ratio increases from 1.24 to 8.27 for wheat, and from 0.91 to 1.13 for orange. However, improvement of irrigation water efficiency leads to a relative increase in the DRC for both commodities. Therefore, further efforts to optimize management practices of irrigation water at field and farm levels are needed. This could be achieved through better irrigation scheduling and deficit irrigation strategy. |
| Keywords: | Environmental Economics and Policy, International Development |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275874&r=eff |
| By: | Laborde Debucquet, David; Piñeiro, Valeria |
| Abstract: | Argentina's G20 presidency has emphasized the needs to improve soil management and increase agricultural productivity in a sustainable way to achieve an inclusive and resilient food future. While increases in agricultural productivity improve economic welfare and can help address food security problems by benefiting both consumers and producers simultaneously, it has to address the depletion of scarce natural resources. In the context of changing climate, achieving sustainable and resilient agricultural production is a major corner stone in both adaptation and mitigation strategies. The global community needs to have the proper tools to monitor sustainable agricultural productivity gains, identifying countries and sectors lagging behind, and committing R&D efforts accordingly to the challenges ahead. As such, it is suggested that 1) an international consortium should monitor Agricultural Total Factor Productivity to provide international comparisons and track performance over time; 2) the G20 should acknowledge and address the issue of sustainable productivity measurement, and; 3) support more in depth research on the relation between Agricultural TFP and Agricultural R&D. |
| Keywords: | agricultural productivity,total factor productivity,TFP measurement,agricultural R&D,sustainable TFP,technological change |
| JEL: | O13 O19 O33 Q16 Q18 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwedp:201864&r=eff |
| By: | Vrachioli, M.; Stefanou, S.; Tzouvelekas, V. |
| Abstract: | The interest in promoting food and water security through development projects has evolved to the need for tools that can evaluate the impact of these projects, and to ensure that the projects reach the most vulnerable (Gertler et al., 2011). This study brings together the stochastic frontier model with impact evaluation methodology to measure the impact on farmers’ technical efficiency (TE) within a modern irrigation technology transition framework. In this study, we apply the Heckman (1979) and Greene (2010) models to correct for selectivity bias that arises from unobserved variables, and then we measure and compare technical efficiency scores (TE) resulting from these models. The empirical application will use data covering 56 small-scale greenhouse farms, mainly cultivating vegetables, from the Ierapetra Valley in the Southeast part of the island of Crete (Greece) for the cropping years from 2009 to 2013. The results reveal that the average technical efficiency for farmers who adopted sprinklers is lower than the group of non-adopters when the presence of selectivity bias cannot be rejected. This outcome can be explained by the fact that after the adoption of new technologies, adopters may need more time to learn how to use the technology efficiently. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Crop Production/Industries, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275973&r=eff |
| By: | Shabbir Ahmad (UQ Business School, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia); Sriram Shankar (ANU Centre for Social Research and Methods & Research School of Economics, Australian National University, Canberra, Australiaa); John Steen (UQ Business School, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia); Martie-Louise Verreynne (UQ Business School, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia); Abid Aman Burki (Department of Economics Mushtaq Ahmad Gurmani School of Humanities and Social Sciences Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan) |
| Abstract: | Smallholders are indispensable to ensuring food security in the developing economies where they farm. Policy interventions often target smallholders to provide for example, input subsidies, extension services and access to credit, because increased total factor productivity (Hsieh & Klenow, 2009) can ensure that they are better placed to support food security. However, the impact of such interventions and the drivers of TFP growth are largely unknown due to lack of comprehensive data and appropriate methodology. To overcome these impediments, we propose an econometric estimation of the components of TFP growth in a Bayesian set-up and apply this to new farm-level survey data of smallholders from Pakistan’s horticulture sector. The results indicate large technical and mix efficiency differentials across agro-climatic zones and farm sizes. These disparities in technical and mix efficiency are due to suboptimal farm practices, potentially from limited access to and adoption of technology. Government policy makers, support agencies, farmer groups and other stakeholders have latitude in providing adequate education and training programs aimed at improving input-use efficiency and introducing innovative practices leading to TFP growth. |
| Keywords: | Scope economies; developing economy; aggregator function; mix efficiency; TFP |
| JEL: | D31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qld:uq2004:597&r=eff |
| By: | Kishi, Keiichi; Okada, Keisuke |
| Abstract: | This study develops the international trade theory of technology diffusion with heterogeneous firms. Each new entrant randomly searches for and meets incumbents and then adopts their existing technology. As in previous international trade models based on firm heterogeneity, trade liberalization induces the least productive firms to exit, and then the resources can be reallocated toward more productive firms. However, we show that this resource reallocation effect is mitigated by the entry of low-productive firms. Trade liberalization facilitates the diffusion of existing low-productive technologies to new entrants, which shifts the weight in the productivity distribution from the upper tail area to the area around the least productivity. Thus, some resources can be reallocated toward low-productive firms. In addition, trade liberalization reduces domestically produced varieties. Consequently, we show the non-monotonic relationship between trade liberalization and aggregate productivity. |
| Keywords: | International trade; Innovation; Productivity distribution |
| JEL: | F12 L11 O33 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:88597&r=eff |
| By: | Trifkovic, Neda |
| Abstract: | The paper analyses how voluntary private standards affect labour productivity of small and medium firms from the food sector in Vietnam. The results based on a three-year panel show that the application of private standards improves labour productivity. These gains primarily occur to firms operating above a threshold labour-intensity level. Firms with low labour intensity are not likely to experience gains in labour productivity from standards. This implies that employee compensation increase due to standards is a likely mechanism for labour productivity gains. The results are robust to several specification changes and instrumental variable estimation. |
| Keywords: | Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety |
| Date: | 2017–08–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaae17:261111&r=eff |
| By: | Eva Lyubich; Joseph S. Shapiro; Reed Walker |
| Abstract: | This paper provides the first estimates of within-industry heterogeneity in energy and CO2 productivity for the entire U.S. manufacturing sector. We measure energy and CO2 productivity as output per dollar energy input or per ton CO2 emitted. Three findings emerge. First, within narrowly defined industries, heterogeneity in energy and CO2 productivity across plants is enormous. Second, heterogeneity in energy and CO2 productivity exceeds heterogeneity in most other productivity measures, like labor or total factor productivity. Third, heterogeneity in energy and CO2 productivity has important implications for environmental policies targeting industries rather than plants, including technology standards and carbon border adjustments. |
| JEL: | F18 H23 Q56 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:18-03r&r=eff |
| By: | In Hwan Jo (National University of Singapore); Tatsuro Senga (Queen Mary University of London) |
| Abstract: | Access to external finance is a major obstacle for small and young firms; thus, providing subsidized credit to small and young firms is a widely-used policy option across countries. We study the impact of such targeted policies on aggregate output and productivity and highlight indirect general equilibrium effects. To do so, we build a model of heterogeneous firms with endogenous entry and exit, wherein each firm may be subject to forward-looking collateral constraints for their external borrowing. Subsidized credit alleviates credit constraints small and young firms face, which helps them to achieve the efficient and larger scale of production. This direct effect is, however, either reinforced or offset by indirect general equilibrium effects. Factor prices increase as subsidized firm demand more capital and labor. As a result, higher production costs induce more unproductive incumbents to exit, while replacing them selectively with productive entrants. This cleansing effect reinforces the direct effect by enhancing the aggregate productivity. However, the number of firms in operation decreases in equilibrium, and this, in turn, depresses the aggregate productivity. |
| Keywords: | Firm dynamics, Misallocation, Financial frictions, Firm size and age |
| JEL: | E22 G32 O16 |
| Date: | 2016–12–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qmw:qmwecw:809&r=eff |
| By: | Wang, S.L.; Huang, J.; Wang, X.; Tuan, F. |
| Abstract: | In this study, we use a multilateral total factor productivity (TFP) panel data, spanning 1985-2013 period, to test hypotheses of convergence to a single TFP level (σ convergence) and to a region-specific steady state TFP growth rate (β convergence) for China’s farm sector. Results show that there is no evidence of an overall σ convergence across all provinces. However, we find robust evidences of β convergence. Estimated rates of β convergence are conditional on how we capture the heterogeneity across regions. Overall, the rate of β convergence ranges from 0.016 to 0.039. Estimates also show that higher growth rate of education, R&D, capital/labor ratio, or intermediate goods/labor ratio can boost the rate of TFP growth. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, International Development |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:276051&r=eff |
| By: | Baffoe-Bonnie, Anthony; Kostandini, Gentian |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Environmental Economics and Policy |
| Date: | 2017–06–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258230&r=eff |
| By: | Pedro Bento; Diego Restuccia |
| Abstract: | We construct a new dataset for the average employment size of establishments across sectors and countries from hundreds of sources. Establishments are larger in manufacturing than in services, and in each sector they are larger in richer countries. The cross-country income elasticity of establishment size is remarkably similar across sectors, about 0.3. We discuss these facts in light of several prominent theories of development such as entry costs and misallocation. We then quantify the sectoral and aggregate impact of entry costs and misallocation in an otherwise standard two-sector model of structural transformation with endogenous firm entry and firm-level productivity. We find that observed measures of misallocation account for the entire range of establishment-size differences across sectors and countries and almost 50 percent of the difference in non-agricultural GDP per capita between rich and poor countries. |
| JEL: | E02 E1 O1 O4 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24968&r=eff |
| By: | Miftari, Iliriana; Gjokaj, Ekrem; Zvyagintsev, Dmitry |
| Keywords: | Crop Production/Industries, Farm Management, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2017–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaae17:268276&r=eff |
| By: | Akogun, Oladele; Dillon, Andrew; Friedman, Jed; Prasann, Ashesh; Serneels, Pieter |
| Keywords: | International Development, Health Economics and Policy, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258380&r=eff |
| By: | Bawa, Siraj G. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Agricultural Finance, Production Economics |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258485&r=eff |
| By: | Micheels, Eric; Paulson, Nick; Skolrud, Tristan |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Finance, Risk and Uncertainty |
| Date: | 2018–04–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:scc018:276142&r=eff |
| By: | Ping Wang; Tsz-Nga Wong; Chong K. Yip |
| Abstract: | Income disparity across countries has been large and widening over time. We develop a tractable model where factor requirements in production technology do not necessarily match a country's factor input profile. Appropriate assimilation of frontier technologies balances such multi-dimensional factor input-technology mismatch, thus mitigating the efficiency loss. This yields a new measure for endogenous TFP, entailing a novel trade-off between a country's income level and income growth that depends critically on the assimilation ability and the factor input mismatch. Our baseline model accounts for 80%-92% of the global income variation over the past 50 years. The widening of mismatch and heterogeneity in the assimilation ability account for 41% and 20% of the global growth variation, whereas physical capital accounts for about one third with human capital largely inconsequential. In particular, about 30% of the output growth in miracle Asian economies comes from narrowing the gap arisen from mismatch, and 94% of the growth stagnation in trapped African economies due to the widening mismatch. A country may fall into a middle-income trap after a factor advantage reversal that changes the pattern of mismatch. |
| JEL: | D90 E23 O40 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:24960&r=eff |
| By: | Paudel, Jayash; Crago, Christine L. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, International Development, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258464&r=eff |
| By: | Song, Danbee; Sam, Abdoul G. |
| Keywords: | Resource/Energy Economics and Policy, Productivity Analysis, Environmental Economics and Policy |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258529&r=eff |
| By: | Young-Hyun Jin (Korea Institute of S&T Evaluation and Planning (KISTEP)); Chang-Dae Park (Korea Institute of S&T Evaluation and Planning (KISTEP)) |
| Abstract: | Korean government has established innovation-supporting facilities in the outside of national capital region. The so-called ?Regional R&D Centers? are equipped with R&D equipment and aim to support R&D activities of the small and medium sized enterprises in the nearby regional industry cluster. Since 2006, more than 582 facilities have been established using more than 10 billion USD. However, there are many debates on the efficacy of the regional R&D centers. In this study, we analyzed the success factors of the selected regional R&D centers using DEA and tobit regression. To measure the efficiency of the regional R&D centers using DEA, we selected budget invested, man-power and operation duration as the input variables and the number companies who utilized the facilities, number of utilization and awareness among the cluster as the output variables. The results showed that the efficiency of the regional R&D centers depends on the types of the host institute of the regional R&D center. We tested the relationship between the efficiency measured by DEA and factors in the planning and operation stages of the centers and environmental factors like GRDP. The tobit analysis showed that the number of partner institutes has strong positive influence to the efficiency in all the efficiency models. The location and support of operational expenses also showed positive influence in some models. The policy implication as well as detailed analysis procedure and results will be discussed in the presentation. |
| Keywords: | regional innovation-supporting facility, DEA, tobit regression, success factor analysis |
| Date: | 2018–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sek:iacpro:6409236&r=eff |
| By: | Le, Stephanie; Jeffrey, Scott R.; An, Henry |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Land Economics/Use, Resource/Energy Economics and Policy |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258487&r=eff |
| By: | Lindbloom, Michael B.; Shanoyan, Aleksan; Griffin, Terry W. |
| Keywords: | Agribusiness, Agricultural Finance, Production Economics |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258454&r=eff |
| By: | Carillo, Mario Francesco |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the effect of agricultural policies on industrialization and economic development over the long-run. I analyze the differential effect of the \textit{Battle for Grain}, implemented by the Italian Fascist regime to achieve self-sufficiency in wheat production, on the development path across areas of Italy. Employing time variation, along with cross-sectional variation in the suitability of land for the implementation of the advanced wheat production technologies, I find that the policy had unintended positive effects on industrialization and economic prosperity which persisted until the contemporary period. Furthermore, I find that the positive effect of the \textit{Battle for Grain} on human capital accumulation was instrumental in this process, suggesting that the complementarity between human capital and agricultural technology may be a critical mechanism through which agricultural productivity may enhance the development of non-agricultural sectors. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Policy; Agricultural Productivity; Industrialization; Human Capital; Long-run Dve |
| JEL: | F13 J24 N54 O13 O14 O25 O33 Q16 Q17 Q18 |
| Date: | 2018–09–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:88941&r=eff |
| By: | Erickson, Kenneth W.; Featherstone, Allen M.; Subedi, Dipak; Nehring, Richard F.; Harris, James Michael |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Finance, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258488&r=eff |
| By: | Jaumandreu, Jordi; Lin, Shuheng |
| Abstract: | We study how firms' innovations impact prices with endogenous productivity and markup, under imperfect competition and dynamic pricing. Absent innovation, productivity plus markup changes curb price growth to half of variable inputs cost growth. Innovation's additional impact on costs is negatively correlated with markup changes. We detect two prevalent strategies. When marginal cost goes down, firms cash-in innovation by increasing the markups to enlarge profits. When marginal cost goes u firms practice countervailing pricing by decreasing markups. With no innovation aggregate manufacturing price growth had multiplied by 1.4, but innovation without cash-in strategies had multiplied it by 0.8. |
| Keywords: | Innovation; marginal cost; markup; price indices |
| JEL: | D43 L11 L16 O31 |
| Date: | 2018–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:13146&r=eff |
| By: | Fan, Yubing; Massey, Raymond E.; Park, Seong C. |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Land Economics/Use, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258561&r=eff |
| By: | Khan, M.A.; Tahir, A. |
| Abstract: | Climate Change is an ever growing issue with a great importance due to wide socio-economic effects. Agriculture is the most climate sensitive economic sector that is influenced both positively and negatively by climate change. A change in temperature or precipitation could cause a significant change in crops productivity and yields. Different crop/bio-physical experts have been making efforts to process the impact of climate on crop yields through different crop modellings using input from different global climate models. In this research, the output of the crop models is used as a shock in the global computable general equilibrium economic model to evaluate the economic effects of climate change. Pakistan has two crop seasons – Kharif and Rabi- therefore two major crops i.e. Wheat and Rice have been chosen for this analysis. A Baseline scenario, representing business as usual with no change in climate, has been created using projections for GDP, population, factor supplies, and required food production. A counterfactual experiment has done using the same GDP and population growth as in the baseline but with addition of crop yield shocks from bio-physical models. A comparison of these two experiments has shown the economic effects of climate change by 2035. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Finance, Environmental Economics and Policy, International Development |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275969&r=eff |
| By: | Wimmer, Stefan G.; Sauer, Johannes |
| Keywords: | Production Economics, Productivity Analysis, Research Methods/Statistical Methods |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258465&r=eff |
| By: | Riera, S. |
| Abstract: | Water is a key resource to agriculture in Mendoza but there are increasing concerns regarding the viability of current practices and availability. Some farms fall short of their production potential, which questions the economic viability of some vineyards, and might trigger structural change and lead to additional pressure on water use. Improvements in irrigation efficiency could help mitigate this problem. Farmers pay for the resource management but do not have to consider the opportunity cost of the resource itself. This paper estimates the technical efficiency (TE) of grapevine production controling for the use of water. The preliminary results point out average efficiency scores of 0.78, where relatively efficient farmers lack proper management practices on water resources. Further estimation of the intrinsic value of irrigation water will provide an additional tool to design specific policies for the sector. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, International Development |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:275995&r=eff |
| By: | Regmi, Madhav; Featherstone, Allen M.; Cowley, Cortney A.; Taylor, Mykel R. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural Finance, Production Economics, Productivity Analysis |
| Date: | 2017–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:aaea17:258422&r=eff |
| By: | Ulimwengu, J.; Makombe, T. |
| Abstract: | With increasingly large shares of public expenditures going toward social sectors in agriculture-based economies, the issue becomes how to design a budget allocation scheme that maximizes agricultural productivity-enhancing effects of social expenditures. This study examines the impact of various subtypes of household health spending on agricultural labor productivity using data from 505 households in five Rwandan districts. Our findings confirm that change in agricultural productivity can be driven by change in marginal productivity of inputs induced by households’ health status. The latter are significantly impacted by households’ own social expenditures. This then suggests that there is a way to bundle social expenditures in order to compensate for the shortage of resources allocated to agriculture and therefore to harness their productivity-enhancing potential. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy, Farm Management |
| Date: | 2018–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:iaae18:276000&r=eff |
| By: | Ion Anghel; Costin Ciora; Daniela Boca |
| Abstract: | The development of new office buildings with green certification created the premises for better understanding of the impact on employees' productivity. The purpose of this paper is to analyze through a questionnaire the productivity perception of employees that work in such buildings. Moreover, the results will be compared with a control group from non-green certified buildings. We are focusing understanding whether the lighting, office furniture, temperature or air quality, which are significant better in green certified buildings, have an effect on the productivity perception. |
| Keywords: | Green Buildings; Productivity; Sustainable Buildings |
| JEL: | R3 |
| Date: | 2018–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arz:wpaper:eres2018_191&r=eff |