In Kenya, trade policy reforms in the cereals sector were initiated as a key componentof the economy-wide structural adjustment programmes (SAPs) during the mid 1980s.The SAPs were later strengthened and made irreversible by Kenya’s commitments atthe multilateral trade negotiations. However,...

Global biofuel production has risen substantially in recent years, driven primarily bygovernment support for biofuel industries. The stated motivations for these initiatives arenumerous and have varied over time. Soybeans are the only field crop produced in sufficientquantities in KwaZulu-Natal...

Interspatial and intertemporal grain distribution in Ghana is a private sectoractivity carried out mainly by traders. These traders sometimes collude to maximize theirjoint profits. By so doing they influence the conduct of the grains market. To examine theeffect of their actions on the informal...

Most adoption studies have employed cross-sectional data in a static discrete choice modellingframework to analyze why some farmers adopt at a certain point in time. The static approachdoes not consider the dynamic environment in which the adoption decision is made and thusdoes not incorporate...

This study investigates firm level technical efficiency of production and its determinantsin a sample of 137 olive oil manufacturing firms in Tunisia using a stochastic frontierproduction model applied to cross-section data. Results indicate that technical efficiencyof production in the sample...

Deficiencies of micronutrients such as vitamin A are widespread, expecially in Africa.Biofortified crops such as maize, bred for high levels of provitamin A might offer a solution, butthese crops are often bright orange, and African maize consumers prefer white. To estimate theconsumers interest...

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the sensory characteristics and consumer acceptability of qualityprotein maize (QPM) in rural Tanzania. Due to the malnutrition problem facing consumers in developing countries,QPM which has almost double the amount of tryptophan and lysine, has been...

The rising world prices for major tradable staples such as maize have been a concern for sub-Saharan countries such as Kenya which are maize deficit countries. Maize is a major staple foodfor over 80 percent of Kenya’s population. Kenya relies on maize for up to 40 percent of itsdietary energy...

The focus of this research was to investigate the comparative advantage of the potatoindustry in seven potato production regions in South Africa. Potatoes are the most importantvegetable crop produced in South Africa. In 2008 it contributed more than 40% to the totalproduction of vegetables in...

The South African Potato industry was deregulated in the early 1990’s, leading to changes in marketstructure. The adjustment in market structure leads to changes in production and marketing practices,including contracting and pricing strategies for processing firms within the industry. The...