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

Agricultural Technology Adoption and Land Productivity: Evidence from the Rice-prawn Gher Farming System in Bangladesh

Basanta Kumar Barmon
JSPS Postdoctoral Foreign Researcher, Department of Agricultural Economics, Hokkaido University, Faculty of Agriculture, Japan

Takumi Kondo
Associate Professor, Department of Agricultural Economics, Hokkaido University, Japan.

Fumio Osanami
Professor, Department of Agricultural Economics, Hokkaido University, Japan.

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

Rice-prawn gher (RPG) farming system is an indigenous agricultural technology solely developed by farmers since mid-1980s. The present study aims to estimate the land productivity of modern varieties (MV) paddy production under RPG and (year-round modern varieties) YRMV paddy farming systems in southwest Bangladesh. The RPG farming system has significant impacts on inputs used in MV boro paddy production. The findings of the study indicate that more chemical fertilizers were used in per ha MV boro paddy production under YRMV paddy farming in comparison with RPG farming. Similarly, per ha cost of irrigation, pesticides and land preparation were also higher in MV boro paddy production under YRMV paddy farming system compared to RPG farming system. The inputs usage for MV boro paddy production under two farming systems showed statistically significant difference with each other. Although fewer inputs were being used in MV boro paddy production under RPG farming system, the yield was higher (statistically significant) than YRP MV paddy farming system. Therefore, it could be concluded that the land productivity of MV paddy production under RPG farming system was significantly higher than the YRMV paddy farming system. The TFP of MV boro paddy production was higher in RPG farming system compared to YRMV paddy farming system. Moreover, the TFP varied widely within the farms between the two farming systems.

Keywords: Rice-prawn gher farming, Year-round MV paddy farming, Land productivity

Location:

Start Date:

End Date:

Program Area: Socio-economic and Policy

Non-commodity: Adoption of technology, Profitability

Objectives:

The present study analyzes land productivity of MV paddy production under RPG and YRMV paddy farming system. Moreover, the present study estimates TFP of MV paddy production between two farming systems.

Methodology:

Farm Survey and Data Collection To assess the impacts of the technologically advanced RPG farming system on land productivity of MV paddy, two contrasting villages- RPG farming system for Bilpabla in Khulna and YRMV paddy farming for Chanchra village in Jessore district were selected. Bilpabla village was selected purposely; because the people have vast experience of RPG farming system like other parts of Khulna district and they directly or indirectly depend on their daily livelihood on various gher-farming activities. On the hand, Chanchra village located in Jessore district was also purposely selected because the farmers cultivate MV paddy throughout the year. Moreover, the Jessore is neighboring of Khulna district. Ninety (90) RPG farmers and 100 YRMV paddy farmers were randomly selected. The farm survey was carried out during November 2006 based on the agricultural cropping year 2005. 2.2 Variable Measurement Farmland is the main input for any agricultural crop production. The farmland input was measured in terms of a hectare. As usual, about 60% land of total gher farming is used for MV paddy production under RPG farming system. Human labor includes both male and female labor used in MV paddy production in a crop calendar year. Two types of human labor used in MV paddy production- hired and family labor. The labor input was calculated in terms of work hours of male and female labor employed for different farm operations. In this study, labor was measured in terms of adult man-days of eight hours. The measurements of hired and family labor are as follows: (1) Hired labor: The existing wage rate of hired labor both for male and female was considered (table 4). (2) Family labor: Both the family supply 4male and female labor engaged in various activities of paddy production. However, the family laborers were not engaged in full-time like hired labors. In addition, sometimes, the efficiency of family labor’s work is not uniform like hired labor, even though, some family members’ work efficiency is the same as hired labor. The difference in the efficiency of labor has been taken into account by converting family labor into hired adult man-days. The other main inputs such as chemical fertilizer, irrigation, pesticides and seedling cost were considered in the existing market price in 2005-06 both for RPG and YRMV paddy farming. The main output of MV paddy farming was paddy grain was considered in terms of volume (kg) both for RPG and YRMV paddy farming. 2.3 Analytical Method Total Factor Productivity (TFP) is the ratio of aggregate output to the aggregate input. The TFP can be measured using the following formula: TFPi = Yi/Xi

Where, i indicate boro, boro and aman paddy under RPG and YRMV paddy farming, respectively. Y indicates the aggregated output index per farm in terms of value and X indicates the aggregated input index per farm in terms of value. The ideal Fisher quantity indexes were used to aggregate inputs and output. The arithmetic means of boro paddy production under RPG farming system was considered as baseline to calculate TFP of MV paddy production between two farming system. CROPPING PATTERNS OF THE STUDY VILLAGE The cropping pattern of the study villages is presented in figure 1. Before the advent of RPG farming in Bilpabla village, the farmers cultivated only local aus and broadcast aus and aman paddy in swampland and transplanting aman (T. aman) paddy in the upper lands. The familiar broadcasting aus and aman paddy has almost disappeared mainly because of mainly siltation of inland rivers and canals, embankments of rivers, and environmental changes. The life cycle of broadcasting aman was longer than the broadcasting aus paddy though the sowing time was same for the both types of paddy. The sowing time of aus and aman paddy is in April/May and harvesting time is in August for broadcasting aus and December for broadcasting aman. The farmer sowed aus and aman seeds together in April/May because after June/July the whole area was going underwater due to heavy rain and at that time it was not possible to transplant aman (T. Aman). This production system of local aus and aman paddy together was locally known as “Domuti”. Under RPG farming, the production period of prawns and fish starts from May/June to December/January, MV boro paddy from January to April and vegetables throughout the year. The farmers have also planted fruit trees (coconut, mango, guava, jackfruit, banana, papaya etc.) on the dikes. Farmers in Chanchra village usually practice YRMV paddy farming because the farms are located in relatively high altitude levels that are not possible to convert into RPG farming system. MV boro paddy is produced from January to April followed by local variety T. aman paddy during July to December.

Source of Information: Paper prepared for presentation at the 104th (joint) EAAE-IAAE Seminar Agricultural Economics and Transition: „What was expected, what we observed, the lessons learned." Corvinus University of Budapest (CUB) Budapest, Hungary. September 6-8, 2007

Article Link (Online Journal):

Funding Source:

Budget:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

RPG farming system is an indigenous agricultural technology solely developed by farmers since mid-1980s. The cropping pattern has changed from YRMV paddy farming to RPG farming system after the introduction of gher farming. The RPG farming system has significant impacts on land productivity for MV paddy production than YRMV paddy farming. The findings of the study indicate that more chemical fertilizers such as urea (72%), TSP (61%) MP (94%) and gypsum (88%) used in per ha MV boro paddy production under YRMV paddy farming compare to RPG farming. Similarly, per ha irrigation (61%), pesticides (26%) and land preparation (17%) cost were also higher in MV boro paddy production under YRMV paddy farming system compared to RPG farming system. Along with main inputs, more hired male labor also used in per ha MV boro paddy production under YRMV paddy farming compared to RPG farming. The total factor productivity for paddy production was higher in RPG farming system compared to YRMV paddy farming system. The TFP varied widely within the farms between the two farming systems. Therefore, it could be concluded that RPG farming system has increased the land productivity for MV paddy production and reduced input usage as well as costs for per ha MV boro paddy production compared to YRMV paddy production in Bangladesh.

Knowledge Management: Report/Proceedings