Summary. -The paper reviews the literature on the characteristics and impact of opinion leaders on the diffusion of new knowledge, concluding that there is no clear evidence on whether opinion leaders are more effective if they are similar in socio-economic attributes to the other farmers rather than superior to would-be followers. A multivariate analysis of the changes in integrated pest management knowledge in Indonesia among follower farmers over the period 1991-98 indicates that opinion leaders who are superior to followers, but not excessively so, are more effective in transmitting knowledge. Excessive socio-economic distance is shown to reduce the effectiveness of diffusion. The paper then derives operational implications of the empirical results.
Using data from the 2005 Albania Living Standards Measurement Study (ALSMS05) survey, this article analyzes the overall impact of household nonfarm income-generating activities (RIGA) on agricultural expenditures as well as technical efficiency of rural farm households. We also differentiate the impact for subsistence and commercial farmers, who are in the top 25% of the distribution of value of annual agricultural sales. Our results show that on the whole, Albanian rural households utilize their nonfarm earnings not to invest in time-saving, efficiency-increasing technologies, but to move out of crop production. We derive similar findings when we try to estimate the same relation separately for commercial and subsistence farmers. However, for commercial farmers, we find a positive impact of household nonfarm earnings on livestock expenditures
While scholars long recognized the importance of land markets as a key driver of rural non-farm development and transformation in rural areas, evidence on the extent of their operation and the nature of participants remains limited. We use household data from 6 countries to show that there is great potential for such markets to increase productivity and equalize factor ratios. While rental markets transfer land to land-poor and labor-rich producers, their operation and thus impact may be constrained by policy restrictions. Their functioning may also be constrained by ill-defined or insecure rights that may arise from failure to fully compensate existing rights in cases of expropriation, a failure to implement more broadly land policies or to do so in a gender sensitive manner. Methodological and substantive conclusions are derived.
Boserup and Ruthenberg (BR) provided the framework to analyze the impact of population growth and market access on the intensification of farming systems. Prior evidence in Africa is consistent with the framework. Over the past two decades, rapid population growth has put farming systems under stress, while rapid urbanization and economic growth have provided new market opportunities. New measures of agro-ecological potential and urban gravity are developed to analyze their impact on population density and market access. The descriptive and regression analyses show that the patterns of intensification across countries are only partially consistent with the BR predictions. Fallow areas have disappeared, but cropping intensities remain very low. The use of organic and chemical fertilizers is too low to maintain soil fertility. Investments in irrigation are inadequate. In light of the promising outcomes suggested by the Boserup-Ruthenberg framework, the process of intensification across these countries appears to have been weak.
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