Technical efficiency among smallholder sweet potato Farmers in Zambia

Agriculture is Zambia’s mainstay and farmers have for long practiced monoculture crop farming in which maize is the most widely grown. Other alternative and more adverse weather tolerant food crops such as sweet potatoes, cassava, sorghum and millet have not been grown much. There is very little known about the technical efficiency of the more adverse weather tolerant food crops and nothing known about the technical efficiency of sweet potato farming in Zambia. Despite government efforts to increase productivity among the smallholder farmers, sweet potato productivity still remains low and this negatively contributes to the agriculture sector’s potential to reduce poverty, increase incomes and improve food security and nutrition. This study uses Post Harvest Survey data of farming season 2011/12 collected by Zambia’s Central Statistical Office on 1483 smallholder sweet potato farmers and a Stochastic Frontier Cobb – Douglas model to determine the technical efficiency of smallholder sweet potato farmers in Zambia.
The results indicate that the smallholder sweet potato farmers are generally technically inefficient with mean technical efficiency of 59 percent and a technical efficiency range of 2 percent to 93 percent. The results also suggest that technical efficiency of the smallholder sweet potato farmers in Zambia is directly correlated with the use of hybrid seed, monocropping and the use of manure. Based on the results, the study recommended that the Government of the Republic of Zambia encourages the use of hybrid seed, the practice of monocropping alongside taking into account comparative and absolute advantage, and the use of manure among the smallholder sweet potato farmers in Zambia. Lastly, the study recommended that the allocation of more land to sweet potato production by the farmers be coupled with a unanimous increase in other vital inputs required in sweet potato production.