A General Approach for Evaluating the Economic Viability of Sustainability of Tropical Cropping Systems

This paper presents a methodology for measuring economic viability and agricultural sustainability for new technology evaluation. The approach is based on the concept of interspatial and intertemporal total factor productivity, paying particular attention to the valuation of natural resource stocks and flows. Using a set of data available at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, the model is demonstrated by computing the intertemporal and interspatial total factor productivity indices for four cropping systems in southwestern Nigeria. Results show that the sustainability and economic viability measures are sensitive to changes in the stock of nutrients as well as to changes in material input uses and outputs. When common property resource flows are important, the measures provide markedly different results from conventional total factor productivity approaches.