Abstract
Food security problems are major issues in developing countries, especially under the conditions of restricted farm resources and environmental degradation. The re-allocation of existing farm resources in the upland in order to reach a production of maximum output under given technologies and the estimated value of the technical efficiency have been important information for this purpose. The objective of this study, therefore, was to measure the technical efficiency of upland rice production in Thailand. The identification of key factors to improve the technical efficiency was additionally carried out. A stochastic frontier approach with the Cobb-Douglas production function was applied. Data used in this study has been drawn from 181 farmers. The findings showed that on average the technical efficiency was 0.70 and the rank of its value varied from 0.22 to 0.94. A significant factor affecting the technical efficiency has been support in terms of transforming knowledge through a training program on upland rice production. Farmers, who grew upland rice for both household consumption and for commercial purposes, had a better performance than those who grew upland rice only for home consumption.
Highlights
Under this production system, land degradation and food security problems have been reported
This study used STATA 10.1 to carry out the Stochastic Frontier Production function and the Inefficiency Model
The Cobb-Douglas Production Function was appropriate to capture the technical efficiency of upland rice production of farmers in Thailand
Summary
Land degradation and food security problems have been reported. Thailand is a major exporter of agricultural and food Athipanyakul and Pakdee (2011) pointed out that more products to the world (Isavilanonda, 2011). More than one-half of land utilization in Thailand significant areas of sugarcane and cassava production, is covered by areas for rice cultivation (OAE, 2012). The trend shows that the production area of rice farmers cannot pay back loans to the lenders. Is declining and the production of field crops and The Thai government has promoted the practice of perennial crops is increasing as a result of higher net growing upland rice to small scale farmers as a crop returns as compared to rice (Isavilanonda, 2011).
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