Resource information
This paper examines the determinants of
agricultural productivity and its link to poverty using
nationally representative data from the Nigeria General
Household Survey Panel, 2010/11. The findings indicate an
elasticity of poverty reduction with respect to agricultural
productivity of between 0.25 to 0.3 percent, implying that a
10 percent increase in agricultural productivity will
decrease the likelihood of being poor by between 2.5 and 3
percent. To increase agricultural productivity, land, labor,
fertilizer, agricultural advice, and diversification within
agriculture are the most important factors. As commonly
found in the literature, the results indicate the
inverse-land size productivity relationship. More
specifically, a 10 percent increase in harvested land size
will decrease productivity by 6.6 percent, all else being
equal. In a simulation exercise where land quality is
assumed to be constant across small and large holdings, the
results show that if farms in the top land quintile had half
the median yield per hectare of farms in the lowest
quintile, production of the top quintile would be 10 times
higher. The higher overall values of harvests from larger
land sizes are more likely because of cultivation of larger
expanses of land, rather than from efficient production. It
should be noted that having larger land sizes in itself is
not positively correlated with a lower likelihood of being
poor. This is not to say that having larger land sizes is
not important for farming, but rather it indicates that
increasing efficiency is the more important need that could
lead to poverty reduction for agricultural households.
