Is the type of agricultural extension services a determinant of farm diversity? Evidence from Kenya

Figures & data

Table 1. Definition of other variables included in the truncated Poisson model.

Variable	Description	Hypothesized effect
Farm size	Land available for cultivation, acres	±
Credit	Access to credit, 1 = yes; 0 = no	–
Household size	Number of members in a household	+
Age	Age of the household head, years	–
Education	Education of the household head, years	–
Distance to tarmac	Distance to nearest tarmacked road, km	–
Shocks	Experienced shocks? Dummy, 1 = yes; 0 = no	+
Group official	Dummy, 1 = yes; 0 = otherwise	+
Gender	Gender of household head, 1 = male; 0 = otherwise	–

Table 2. Differences in farmers’ characteristics based on their level of farm diversity in Kisii and Nyamira Counties, Kenya.

Independent variables	Full sample	(25%) LD	(25%) MD
Total farm diversity (number)^a ****	13.91 (0.14)	9.19 (0.14)	18.73 (0.13)
Age of household head (years) ^a **	50.01 (0.44)	49.33 (0.97)	52.40 (0.77)
Education of household head (years) ^a ***	9.39 (0.11)	8.95 (0.20)	9.67 (0.23)
Farm size (acres) ^a ***	1.27 (0.03)	1.08 (0.03)	1.55 (0.05)
Household size (number) ^a *	5.33 (0.06)	5.18 (0.11)	5.47 (0.12)
Distance to nearest market (km) ^a	1.97 (0.10)	2.09 (0.17)	1.73 (0.12)
Wealth status (index) ^a	0.02 (0.04)	−0.11 (0.05)	0.11 (0.08)
Access to credit (%)^b ***	35.08 (0.02)	23.12 (0.03)	46.24 (0.04)
Access to government extension (%) ^b ***	30.28 (0.02)	24.73 (0.03)	41.40 (0.04)
Access to NGO extension (%) ^b **	54.97 (0.02)	49.46 (0.04)	59.68 (0.04)
Access to private extension (%) ^b **	10.62 (0.01)	9.68 (0.02)	17.20 (0.03)
Group official (%)^b	43.01 (0.05)	37.63 (0.06)	45.70 (0.10)
Household head is male (%)^b	75.94 (0.02)	74.19 (0.03)	73.66 (0.03)
Observations	744	186	186

Notes: LD, least diversified; MD, most diversified; Standard errors in parentheses; mean differences significant at ***1%, **5%, *10% based on one-way ANOVA (^a) and Chi square (^b).

Table 3. Effect of the type of extension service on farm diversity, truncated Poisson estimates.

Control variables	Total farm diversity	Crop diversity	Livestock diversity
	Average marginal effects
Access to government extension (dummy)	0.849** (2.46)	0.692** (2.07)	0.141 (1.68)
Access to NGO extension (dummy)	0.387 (0.96)	0.286 (0.76)	0.146 (1.41)
Access to private extension (dummy)	0.907** (2.16)	0.899** (2.13)	0.000 (0.00)
Access to government & NGO extension	0.637 (1.70)	0.489 (1.34)	0.178** (2.13)
Access to government & private extension	0.173 (0.24)	0.108 (0.15)	0.037 (0.24)
Access to NGO & private extension	0.651 (0.83)	0.657 (0.85)	−0.051 (−0.33)
Access to government & NGO & private extension	0.182 (0.19)	0.118 (0.12)	0.008 (0.04)
Wald Chi^2	***	***	***
Log pseudo likelihood	Negative	Negative	Negative

Notes: ** denotes significance at the 5% level. Robust z statistics clustered at group level are shown in parentheses. The models controlled for age, gender, education, farm size, credit, household size, wealth, distance to tarmac and being a group official (see supplementary tables for full models).