Economic and Financial Sustainability of Private Agricultural Extension in El Salvador

Abstract

Since the beginning of the 1980s, El Salvador has shown a dramatic decline in the public funding for agricultural extension. This process follows a worldwide tendency to reduce the public sector involvement in agriculture. To respond to the reduction in public expenditure in extension programs, a privatization process has been proposed as a feasible alternative for agricultural development. The main purpose of this paper is to evaluate the sustainability of the Farm Management Center (FMC) model as a specific private agricultural extension option in El Salvador. To pursue this objective, an ex ante economic and financial cost-benefit analysis based on a multiperiod linear programming model is performed. The general results of this study suggest that a combination of better farm prices (paid and received), reallocation of resources, and crop diversification, which would be promoted by an FMC, can lead Daniel Solís is Research Associate, Office of International Affairs (OIA), and a Graduate Student,

Soil conservation and technical efficiency among hillside farmers in Central America: a switching regression model*

“…These statistics appear to confirm the findings presented by Bravo‐Ureta et al . (2006b), Solís and Bravo‐Ureta (2005) and Sanders et al . (1995) who suggest that, in Central America, more conservative producers retreat to subsistence crops – where they use few inputs generating low returns – and engage in as much off‐farm work as they can, in order to obtain the necessary means to support their families.…”

National extension policy and state-level implementation: The case of Cross River State, Nigeria

“…Despite advocating for the privatization of extension services, various studies (Dinar and Keynan 2001;Anderson and Feder 2007;Solís and Bravo-Ureta 2005;Qamar 2005;Birner and Anderson 2007;Feder, Birner, and Anderson 2011) have submitted that there is genuine fear that the zeal for privatization could prevent small farmers from benefiting from the services. Small farmers either do not believe that extension advice is worth paying for or they simply cannot afford to pay.…”

Future Crop Yield Projections Using a Multi-model Set of Regional Climate Models and a Plausible Adaptation Practice in the Southeast United States

“…Furthermore, an economic analysis for the irrigation system can be performed using our results. The net present value (NPV) and the internal rate of return (IRR) can be used to measure the returns of the irrigation systems [44,45]. The NPV compares the discounted costs of a project with the discounted benefits.…”