There is controversy about whether geography matters mainly because of its contemporaneous impact on economic outcomes or because of its interaction with historical events. Looking at terrain ruggedness, we are able to estimate the importance of these two channels. Because rugged terrain hinders...

This paper examines the impact of climatic change on the level of total agricultural production of Sub-Sahara Africa (SSA) and non-Sub-Sahara Africa (NSSA) developing countries. In doing so it uses a new cross-country panel climatic dataset in an agricultural production framework. The results...

Altruism among family members can, in some cases, inhibit cooperation by increasing the utility that players expect to receive in a non-cooperative equilibrium. To test this, we examine agricultural productivity in polygynous households in West Africa. We find that cooperation is greater –...

We measure the impact of the Farmers Income Diversification Program (FIDP), an EU funded program implemented in Malawi from late 2005 onwards, aiming at increasing agricultural productivity, diversification, value addition, commercialization and trade of subsistence farmers. The geographical...

Transaction costs play a key role in the behaviour of smallholders in developing countries. We exploit the introduction of an additional tobacco auction floor in Malawi to investigate the impact of a reduction in transaction costs and improved market access on production per hectare and the...

We exploit plot data from the agricultural module of the third Malawi Integrated Household Survey (IHS-3) to investigate how organic cultivation techniques contribute to productivity of non-subsidized local maize and what to expect from using organic inputs on a larger scale. We approximate...

The relationship between forests and human nutrition is not yet well understood. A better understanding of this relationship is vital at a time when the majority of new land for agriculture is being cleared from forests. We use Demographic Health Survey food consumption data for over 93,000...

Modern biotechnology, including the application of transgenic techniques to produce Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), can play a significant role in increasing agricultural production in a sustainable way, but its products need to be tailored for the developing world. In sub-Saharan Africa,...

Cameroon has the largest forest area in africa. industrial logging operations export timber products to Europe, america and asia, and informal chainsaw milling (Csm) operations supply the domestic market and many other african countries. The Ònorthern trailÓ is an informal supply chain that...