Value Addition and Productivity Differentials in the Nigerian Cassava System

Temitayo Adeyemo,Victor Okoruwa

doi:10.3390/su10124770

Abstract

There is an increasing need to improve value addition in order to get maximum utility from agricultural systems. Using a retrospective panel data from 482 cassava farmers covering the years 2015–2017, this study examined the effect of value addition on productivity of farmers in the cassava system in Nigeria. We analysed a non-parametric Data Envelopment Analysis to examine productivity across cassava production systems over the three year period. We also examined the impact of value addition on productivity using an endogenous switching regression to account for unobservables that determine the decision to add value and productivity of the farmers. The study found that cost and revenue outlays increased with value addition. Cassava farmers in general operated below the efficiency frontier, with total productivity declining over the 2015–2017 period. However, higher value addition farmers had better efficiency and non-reducing productivity in the periods studied. We found evidence of selection bias in the decision to add value and productivity of the farmers. The conditional and unconditional outcome estimates revealed positive gains in productivity with value addition, confirming the hypothesis that value addition increases farming households’ productivity. We recommend that essential services such as extension services, agricultural training, and ease of enterprise registration that drive agricultural value addition be made available to farmers.

Highlights

The practice of subsistence agriculture on marginal lands and low resource utilization is no longer feasible for sustaining farm families [1]
With respect to the analysis of cassava production systems on the basis of the extent of value addition and utilization of cassava biomass, there has been a dearth of information
The descriptive shows that a smaller proportion of the farmers have agricultural training, we find that training is important in changing production perspective of the agricultural households towards a better frontier than was previously operated on [54,55]

Summary

Introduction

The practice of subsistence agriculture on marginal lands and low resource utilization is no longer feasible for sustaining farm families [1]. There has arisen the need for the development of farming systems that stems from the need to integrate components and resources of farming families in order to minimize costs and maximize positive outcomes. This development of farming systems is a bid to ensure the sustainability of farmers’ livelihood. Production systems have been shown to develop mainly from different ecologies of production, extent of utilization of product, extent of market access, type of cropping system, as well as extent of diversification of production [2]. With respect to the analysis of cassava production systems on the basis of the extent of value addition and utilization of cassava biomass, there has been a dearth of information

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Results

Conclusion