This study provides empirical evidence on the effects of production risk on farm technology adoption among small holder farmers using plot-level data collected from two semi-arid districts in Kenya, Machakos, and Taita Taveta. We employed a two-stage approach to estimate a production function,...

In this paper we investigate the factors affecting income levels, income growth, and poverty reduction in rural Indonesia following the crisis of 1997/98. We particu- larly investigate the relative roles of non-farm incomes, productivity improvements achieved via changes in crops versus...

Supermarkets and high-value exports are currently gaining ground in the agri-food systems of many developing countries. While recent research has analyzed income effects in the small farm sector, impacts on farming efficiency have hardly been studied. Using a survey of Kenyan vegetable growers...

In this paper we examine gender differences in cocoa production in Cameroon using a survey of about 1000 cocoa producers in Southern Cameroon. We find that women farmers have access to land (of similar size to men), but through different mechanisms than men. They are strongly disadvantaged when...

A steep decline in coffee prices at the producer level led to considerable pressure for farmers in Costa Rica and producer countries all over the world. One possible reaction was moving to specialty markets, where price pressure was perceived to be lower. We use original survey data from 2002/03...

There is a well-known debate about the role of institutions in explaining the long-term development of countries. We believe there is value-added to consider the institutions hypothesis at the micro level within a country to analyze the exact transmission channels linking endogenous...

While several studies have shown that genetically modified Bt cotton can benefit smallholder farmers economically, the sustainability of these effects is still unclear and debated controversially between biotechnology proponents and critics. We use unique panel data of 533 cotton farmers,...

This paper presents a flexible conceptual and methodological framework to model the dynamics of agricultural transition in the increasingly complex rural-urban interfaces of large cities. Our empirical analysis is based on data of a household survey conducted in the rural-urban interface of...

This paper studies the implications of climatic uncertainty and poverty for resource degradation. In doing so, two partial models are considered. The first model focuses on productive inputs only, while the second model describes the role of soil conservation inputs. Both models are first...

Most studies on the problem of optimal soil conservation have analyzed soil conservation measures as being time-limited in their effect. This paper extends previous analyses of the soil conservation decision by allowing farmers to make investments in soil conservation structures such as...