Factors Affecting Farm-specific Production Efficiency in the Savanna Zones of West Africa

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dc.creatorOkike, Iheanacho
dc.creatorJabbar, M.A.
dc.creatorManyong, Victor M.
dc.creatorSmith, Jimmy W.
dc.creatorEhui, Simeon K.
dc.date2004-03-01
dc.date2011-06-25T09:00:48Z
dc.date2011-06-25T09:00:48Z
dc.date.accessioned2026-06-27T16:46:39Z
dc.descriptionAgricultural intensification involving greater crop–livestock interactions and integration is emerging as the most promising strategy for improving agricultural production and productivity in much of Sub-Sahara Africa. In West Africa, where this process is at various stages of evolution, 559 farm households from the Sudan Savanna (SS) and Northern Guinea Savanna (NGS) zones were studied to examine the factors affecting production efficiency. The farms in each zone were divided into four socio-economic domains using a combination of population density and market access as criteria. Estimation of stochastic frontier production function indicated the need to include ecological and socioeconomic variables in both the production function and the accompanying inefficiency equation, failing which such models may suffer from omitted variables bias. The results showed that inefficiency effects of a stochastic nature existed among the sample farms and average efficiency was 76%: 68% in the SS and 86% in the NGS zones. Further, increased resource use associated with agricultural intensification was not always accompanied by an increase in production efficiency; and while agricultural intensification based on high external input strategies yields higher marginal returns in the NGS, a similar strategy is not critical to success in the SS given current use levels and the biophysical endowments of the latter ecological zone.
dc.identifierhttps://hdl.handle.net/10568/3996
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/123456789/132852
dc.languageen
dc.publisherOxford University Press
dc.rightsLimited Access
dc.sourceOkike, I. (2004). Factors Affecting Farm-specific Production Efficiency in the Savanna Zones of West Africa. Journal of African Economics, 13(1), 134–165. https://doi.org/10.1093/jae/13.1.134
dc.subjectproduction factors
dc.subjectfarms
dc.subjectproductivity
dc.subjecteconometric models
dc.subjectfarming systems
dc.subjectefficiency
dc.subjectfarm inputs
dc.subjectsocioeconomic organization
dc.subjecthouseholds
dc.subjectproduction functions (econometrics)
dc.subjectlivestock
dc.titleFactors Affecting Farm-specific Production Efficiency in the Savanna Zones of West Africa
dc.typeJournal Article

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