Efficiency differentials in resource-use among smallholder cassava farmers in southwestern Cameroon

ABSTRACT

Cassava has been identified as one of the staples that can reduce food security and help achieve the Sustainable Development Goal of “zero hunger”. This article aims to estimate the efficiency levels of cassava producers in the Southwest region of Cameroon and to identify factors that account for efficiency differentials. The results show that, on average, cassava farmers are 64% technically efficient under the constant returns to scale and 96% under the variable returns to scale assumptions. The difference between the two models suggests the existence of scale inefficiency. Results also show that variables such as farm size, experience and land-use intensity are factors that significantly enhance the efficiency of cassava producers. A key recommendation is the need for policies that ensure increased access to agricultural land as well as secure tenure for cassava producers.

KEYWORDS:

• Aid – Development policies
• Environment (built and natural) – Agriculture
• Labour and livelihoods – Economics

Notes on contributors

Ernest Lytia Molua is Associate Professor and Registrar of the University of Buea in Cameroon. A seasoned researcher in production economics and the economics of climate change, he holds a PhD in Agricultural Economics from the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, Germany.

Martin Paul Jr. Tabe-Ojong is a PhD candidate in Agricultural Economics at the Institute for Food and Resource Economics, University of Bonn, Germany. His research areas are household economics and impact evaluation, as well as productivity and efficiency analysis. He is currently working on aspirations, economic mobility and rural poverty in Kenya.

Majory O. Meliko is a Lecturer in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness at the University of Buea. Her research interests are farm production and profitability, agricultural extension and policy.

Miranda Fotabong Nkenglefac is a Research Assistant with the Center for independent Development Research (CIDR) in Buea, Cameroon. She holds an MSc in Agricultural Economics from the University of Buea in Cameroon.

Ajapnwa Akamin is an Adjunct Lecturer and PhD student in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness at the University of Buea. He teaches and researches on applied statistics and econometrics, and productivity and efficiency analysis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 The two-stage DEA in this context refers to the approach in the literature whereby a Tobit or ordinary least squares estimation is used to identify factors influencing efficiency. This is different from the connotation suggested by Coelli (1996) who uses it to define the manner in which slacks are dealt with (using a second LP problem, as opposed to the one-stage or multi-stage model).