Agricultural Research Management Information System

Home
Research Summary
Search
About Us
- ARMIS
- Brochure
Contact Us
Report
User Request
Data Input
Help
- Operation Manual
  - PDF
  - Video
- Program Area & Commodity
We have reached 37600 number of research entries at this moment.

- Logout

Research Detail

Home
Research
Detail

Extent of Farm Mechanization and Technical Efficiency of Riceproduction in Some Selected Areas of Bangladesh

Pooja Vortia
Department of Agricultural Economics, BangladeshAgricultural University, Mymensingh 2202, Bangladesh

Mahmuda Nasrin
Department of Agricultural Economics, BangladeshAgricultural University, Mymensingh 2202, Bangladesh

Shahana Khatun Bipasha
Department of Agricultural Economics, BangladeshAgricultural University, Mymensingh 2202, Bangladesh

Md. Monirul Islam
Department of Agricultural Economics, BangladeshAgricultural University, Mymensingh 2202, Bangladesh

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

The research has been conducted to explore the extent of adopting mechanization at farm level and its impact on rice producers’ technical efficiency. Primary data and information required for analytical approach have been collected using structured questionnaire through field survey of 200 farm households located in two districts of Bangladesh. Farm households were selected following multistage purposive sampling technique and were classified into two groups on the basis of extent of using modern agricultural practices. Technical efficiency is the ratio between actual and potential output of a production unit. Farmers strongly agree that farm mechanization save their precious time which they spend for farming period and also increased overall food production.They also agree that the use of modern machinery improve their consumption level as well as food security. From the profitability analysis of two levels of mechanization, it is apparent that mechanization has positive impact and leading to increase productivity and profitability of rice producers. The results from DEA approach implies that farms with higher level of mechanization are technically more efficient than the others although both farm groups are technically inefficient in rice production. The findings from Tobit regression show that variables such as farming experience, age and levels of farm mechanization were significantly associated with the technical efficiency of sample farms. Inefficiency of farms is negatively influenced by the level of farm mechanization indicated that mechanization is one of the important determinants to improve technical efficiency. So, the applications of modernized farming machineries could be an essential tool for the development of agricultural sector in Bangladesh.

Keywords: Farm mechanization, Farmers perceptions, Comparative profitability, Technical efficiency, Data envelopment analysis, Tobit regression model

Location: Dinajpur and Mymensingh

Start Date:

End Date:

Program Area: Farm Mechanization

Commodity: Performance evaluation

Objectives:

No studies have found in literature in dealing with the impact of agricultural mechanization on farm efficiency and rice production in Bangladesh. To assess the effectiveness of mechanization in raising farm production, the improvements in farming efficiency have to be measured. For efficient use of machineries and better acceptance of modern agricultural implements, farmer’s perception about mechanization have to be measured. The main concentration of this research is on finding out the effect of agricultural mechanization on efficiency differentials across farms which will assist policy makers in identifying ways for refining agricultural policies in order to improve production performances of different farm groups.

Methodology:

The research utilizes primary data for analytical tools which have been collected from field survey through using structured questionnaire. The samples were selected through a multi-stage purposive sampling technique. Bangladesh is divided into eight administrative divisions. Among them, two districts namely, Dinajpur and Mymensingh under two divisions were selected for necessary data collection on the basis of rice farming concentration. From each district, four sub-districts and four villages were selected after consultation with key informants from Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) and Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI). A total of 200 farm households from the selected sub-districts were inter-viewed purposively along with some focus group discussions. The primary criterion for selecting these regions are the concentration of rice farming activities through mechanization. After data collection, the farms were classified into two groups to study the technical efficiency: a) farms with more than 50% mechanization (those farms which use farm machineries for operating equal to or more than 50% of agricultural operations); and b) farms with less than50% mechanization (those farms which practice mechanization for operating less than 50% farming operations. Land preparation, planting, weeding, fertilizer application, pesticides application, irrigation, harvesting and threshing are the main eight farming operations in rice production which are considered for possible mechanization in the study areas. Descriptive statistical tools such as; average, percentages, ratios, etc. were used to explore the extent of farm mechanization. The technical efficiency of rice growing farmers was measured by using non-parametric analysis (data envelopment analysis). After that, the Tobit regression model gave estimations for the impact of farm mechanization on farm technical efficiencies. Measurement of farmers’ perception about farm mechanization Farmers’ perception regarding farm mechanization is investigated in this research. For this perception index, Likert scale questionnaire is followed. A Likert scale questionnaire is the one in which the subjects are asked to mark how much they agree with the point of view in the item (statement) (Elia et al.2015; Jannat andUddin2016). In this study, this scale is used to assess the perception regarding use of mechanization in agriculture. The research includes 7 positive statements related to the use of farm mechanization following 5-point Likert scale score. Profitability analysis of rice production Per hectare profitability of enterprise production, from the view point of individual farmers was measured in terms of gross return, gross margin, net return and benefit–cost–ratio. The formula needed for the calculation of profitability is discussed as follows (Dillonand Hardaker1993). To assess the effectiveness of farm mechanization in raising farmers’ technical efficiency, an empirical approach consisting of two parts has been employed in this research following Nasrin et al. (2018). At first, anon-parametric approach is employed to compute technical efficiency scores for individual farms. Technical efficiency (TE) is related to the farm’s ability to achieve highest possible output from a given level of input or obtaining a given level of output using minimum feasible amounts of inputs (Varian1992).Efficient utilization of resources is more important than maximizing the amount of resources for both economic and social welfare of the country. For that purpose, technical efficiency in rice production is considered in this research. Efficiency can be estimated by employing either parametric or non-parametric methods. However, Nasrin et al. (2018) argued that the parametric approach may not be appropriate when farmers face different factor endowments following explanations of (Ali and Flinn1989). This situation is also observed in this research and there-fore, non-parametric approach has been employed. Data envelopment analysis (DEA) is one of the most important non-parametric approaches for estimating efficiency which does not impose any prior parametric restrictions on the production technology as compared to parametric approach and hence is less sensitive to model mis-specification (Cooper et al.2007). It avoids the requirement of any distributional assumption for the inefficiency terms (Coelli1995). There is no specific criterion regarding which method is superior to another, so the choice of a particular method depends on the researcher. Therefore, DEA, a non-parametric mathematical programming approach to efficiency estimation, has been applied in this research. This approach allows the researcher to estimate efficiency scores for any sample sizes. Moreover, it has the advantage of evaluating technical as well as allocative and economic efficiencies. DEA involves the use of linear programming methods to construct a non-parametric piece wise frontier over the data in order to calculate efficiencies and allows the researcher to estimate efficiency scores for any sample sizes. The efficiency scores vary from zero (a zero output from non-zero inputs) to one (the most efficient farms located at the frontier) (Nasrinet al. 2018). The input based technical efficiency (TE) under variable returns to scale (VRS) is obtained by solving the following problem (Banker et al.1984).

Source of Information: GeoJournal Springer Nature B.V. 2019

Article Link (Online Journal): https://doi.org/10.1007/s10708-019-10095-1

Funding Source:

1.

Budget:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

The main aim of this study is to explore the relationship between agricultural production and farm mechanization. For that purpose, at first the level of farm mechanization practice at different farming operations is explored and farmer’s opinion about the impact of mechanization on their livelihood is perceived. The study reveals that Bangladesh is still lag behind in mechanizing various operations fully due to availability of modern agricultural machinery and it’s spare parts. The results of the study have clearly indicated that higher level of mechanization increases the overall technical efficiency of the farms. The contribution of level of farm mechanization along with other influencing factors in reducing these inefficiencies has been measured using Tobit regression. Level of farm mechanization has a significant negative effect on technical inefficiency of rice production. That means, by reducing technical inefficiency, farm mechanization has been helpful to bring about a significant improvement in agricultural productivity and efficiency. Moreover, the success of farm mechanization will be augmented by putting equal emphasis on other efficiency enhancing factors such as, facilitating income generating activities in rural areas, providing regular extension services. So,special emphasis should be placed on the adaptation of machineries in different level of farming operations for the overall development of agricultural sector which enhance national strength. Development of rice sector industry which is the basic foundation for agriculture sector will require investment in farm mechanization to drive agricultural growth and productivity. Therefore, the policy makers should consider the role of farming machinery as an important issue and should give more emphasis on the development of farm mechanization in the country. The generalization of the findings of this study is subject to certain limitations. For instance, the study areas were selected to only two districts of Bangladesh because of limited time and resource allocation.Agricultural characteristics of these study areas might not make a sense on overview of the country. The sample size may not be statistically sufficient but can contribute to develop understanding about the extent of farm mechanization and technical efficiency of rice production in these regions. Even, the outcomes of Tobit model are only rough indicators. As a supporting tool it can contribute to the debate on determinants for differences in technical inefficiency and impact of farm mechanization in relation to the qualitative and quantitative as well as social, economic and environ-mental variables, primarily at the district level. So,there exists scope for policy planners to adapt the model and change the variables according to necessity.

Knowledge Management: Journal