Despite the fact that, agriculture remains to be the most significant sector of the Ethiopian economy, its performance has been disappointing and food production has been lagging behind population growth. Although increasing population pressure and low levels of agricultural productivity have aggravated the food insecurity situation by widening the gap between the demand for and supply of food in the country. This gap can be decreased by improving productivity either through the introduction of modern technologies or improving the efficiency of crop production. However, as the possibility to enhance production by bringing more resources into use became more and more limited, the efficiency with which the farmers use available resources has received the greatest attention. Since maize is a significant contributor to the Ethiopian economy, escalating productivity and efficiency of maize production could be taken as an important step in achieving food security. This review was aimed at assessing the levels of technical, allocative and economic efficiencies of smallholder maize producers; and to identify factors affecting the efficiency of smallholder farmers in maize production in Ethiopia. In these review factors like education, land fragmentation, livestock ownership, a frequency of extension contact, soil fertility, off/non-farm activities, sex, land owned, credit utilization and perception on agricultural policy are identified as the key determinants of the economic efficiency of maize production in Ethiopia. The frequency distribution of technical, allocative and economic efficiency levels was not fairly distributed. The maize farms were being operated in a different level of efficiency. This implies that a large number of maize farmers in Ethiopia faced inefficiency problems. Keywords: Maize, Economic efficiency, Determinants, Ethiopia DOI : 10.7176/FSQM/84-04
The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic shocked most economic activities, including agriculture and food production, with limited access to key inputs such as labor, seeds, fertilizer, and other agrochemicals. Food marketing and trade were equally disrupted as cash flows, liquidity, and credit access were constrained. Different countries, organizations, and households improvised various strategies and measures to mitigate the shocks in the food value chain that would have had far-reaching implications. In Uganda, one international organization, the Agricultural Business Initiative (aBi), supported a project titled "Building the Resilience of Smallholder Farmers through Increasing Access to Agro-Inputs" to safeguard the production, trade, and processing of key food staples. This paper assesses the contribution of such emergency projects and draws lessons for similar future interventions. Cross-sectional data collected was used from project beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries as a control group and employ propensity score matching techniques to measure the project's impact. Results show a significant positive impact of the project intervention on crop yields and household crop income. The study recommends partnerships with local government extension workers for promoting sustainability and scaling out. Future similar projects could target to support farmers based on individual capacity in terms of resources, especially land, instead of providing uniform support which may exclude some farmers. Key words: Agro-inputs subsidy, COVID-19, evaluation, propensity score matching.
