Bingxin Yu

The total factor productivity in China and India: new measures and approaches

Purpose - This paper aims to measure and compare agricultural total factor productivity (TFP) growth in China and India and relates TFP growth in each country to policy milestones and investment in agricultural research. Design/methodology/approach - TFP is measured using a non-parametric Malmquist index which allows the decomposition of TFP growth into its components: efficiency and technical change. Findings - Comparing TFP growth in China and India it is found that efficiency improvement played a dominant role in promoting TFP growth in China, while technical change has also contributed positively. In India, the major source of productivity improvement came from technical change, as efficiency barely changed over the last three decades, which explains lower TFP growth than in China. Agricultural research has significantly contributed to improve agricultural productivity in both China and India. Even today, returns to agricultural R&D investments are very high, with benefit/cost ratios ranging from 20.7 to 9.6 in China and from 29.6 to 14.8 in India. Originality/value - The applied methodology and the comparison between TFP growth patterns contribute to a better understanding of the consequences that the different approaches to agricultural reform followed by China and India had on the performance of agriculture in both countries.

Improved Performance of Agriculture in Africa South of the Sahara: Taking Off or Bouncing Back

The improved performance of the agricultural sector in Africa south of the Sahara during the most recent decade (2000–2010) has raised questions about the drivers behind the growth. Skeptics argue that rising commodity prices, as world markets experience a commodity boom, are the main cause of the agricultural growth. Others point to improvements in the policy environment and increased investments in agriculture at a time when African governments and donors have been rallying to increase their support to agriculture. Is African agriculture undergoing a new and sustained recovery after many decades of stagnant and volatile growth rates—or is it simply riding the current global commodity boom? We attempt to answer this question by analyzing the structure of overall agricultural growth in the past 30 years using a growth decomposition approach. Results show both good and bad news for future prospects of African agricultural growth. The good news is that a changing policy environment and increased attention to agriculture has had a major effect on overall productivity growth based on technical efficiency gains. The bad news is that most of this productivity growth is the result of countries recovering from the poor performance of the 1980s and 1990s together with favorable domestic prices. A key challenge for African countries in the years to come is to transform the current windfall gains from favorable high commodity prices and the one-time effects of policy reforms into sustainable growth based on technical change.

Agricultural productivity growth and drivers: a comparative study of China and India

Purpose - – China and India have made significant strides in transforming their agricultural sectors to cut hunger and poverty for the masses through improved agricultural productivity. Given limited land and shift of labor to non-agricultural sector, increasing productivity will continue to be central in agricultural growth in the twenty-first century. The purpose of this paper is to provide comparative analysis of the agricultural total factor productivity (TFP) growth in the two countries. It complements existing literature by examining the evolution and drivers of TFP at disaggregated sub-national level. Richer data allows a deeper understanding of the nature and drivers of TFP growth in the two countries. Design/methodology/approach - – This paper applies different analytical framework to address different research questions using data since 1980. China study estimates a parametric output-based distance function using a translog stochastic frontier function. Productivity growth index and its multiple components are calculated using parameters derived from the parametric approach to identify the characteristics of technology such as structural bias. India study first applies data envelopment analysis to estimate the aggregate productivity growth index, technical change (TC), and efficiency change. Next productivity indexes by for traditional crops are estimated using growth accounting framework at state level. Finally, a panel regression links TFP on its determinants. Findings - – Several common themes emerge from this comparative study. Faced with similar challenges of limited resources and growing demand, improving productivity is the only way to meet long-term food security. Agriculture sector has performed impressively with annual TFP growth beyond 2 percent in China and between 1 and 2 percent in India since the 1980s. The TFP growth is mainly propelled by technological advance but efficiency had been stagnant or even deteriorated. This study provides a granular picture of within country heterogeneity: fast growth in the North and Northeast part of China, South and East of India. Research limitations/implications - – The study suggests some possible policy interventions to improve agricultural productivity, including investment in agricultural R & - D to create advanced production technology, effective extension programs and supportive policies to increase efficiency, and diversification from staple crops for sector-wide growth. The India study suggests certain policies may not be contributing much to productivity growth in the long run due to a negative impact on environment. Further studies are needed to expand the productivity analysis to take into consideration of the negative externalities to the society. Data enhancement to account for quality-adjusted inputs could improve the estimation of productivity growth. Originality/value - – Each country study reveals certain prospects of the agricultural sector and production technology. China analysis statistically confirms the existence of technical inefficiency and technology progress, suggests the translog form is appropriate to capture the production technology and satisfies conditions stipulated in theoretical models. The results indicate TC does not influence the contribution of output or input to the production process. India study pinpoints the lagging productivity growth of traditional crops, which still derives growth from input expansion. Although different states benefited from different crops, sector-wide productivity gain is primarily the result of diversification to high-value crops and livestock products.

A typology of food security in developing countries

The recent surge in food prices around the world may reverse the gains of reducing hunger and poverty in the recent years. This paper employs factor and sequential typology analysis using data for 175 countries to identify groups of countries categorized according to four measures of food security: utilization, availability, accessibility and stability. Nine indicators are used for this study: calories intake, protein intake, fat intake, food production, the ratio of total exports to food imports, soil fertility, length of growing period, coefficient of variation of length of growing period and urbanization. The analysis first identifies 5 distinct food security groups characterized by food intake then further split these groups based on similarities and differences across the various measures of food production, trade security and agricultural potentials. The result suggests that the general category of “developing countries” is very heterogeneous and is not very useful if the focus is on issues of food security. Our food security classification is aligned with national income level and malnutrition status, but does not perfectly map to poverty headcount. The analysis provides tailored policy recommendations focusing on agricultural production for countries sharing the same typology.