Farmers’ agricultural tractor preferences in Ethiopia: a choice experiment approach

Abstract

Unless supported by agricultural mechanization, achieving sustainable development goals is generally challenging in sub-Saharan African countries, specifically so in Ethiopia. Animal power is the dominant mode for plowing, threshing, and transportation in Ethiopia and yet, at the same time little effort was employed to assess subsistence farmer’s tractor demand in the study area. This study was conducted to understand the preferences of wheat producer subsistence farmers for agricultural tractors in Ethiopia in 2017. A random sample of 79 households participated in either rental or purchase choice experiments. The descriptive statistics revealed that 42% of respondents chose to buy tractors, and 43% preferred to use rental services. The random parameter logit estimation result showed that plowing-and-transporting tractors were preferred by the farmers who participated in the purchase design. They are also willing to pay ETB 149,142 (USD 6516) for transporting-only tractors, ETB 218,253 (USD 9536) for plowing-only tractors, and ETB 367,957 (USD 16,077) for plowing-and-transport-only tractors. However, due to the exclusion of high wheat producers in the rent experiment, the current rental price was found to be far from the 99% confidence interval of the estimated price. The government should promote and encourage the appropriate use of agricultural tractors that are affordable for subsistence farmers through rental or purchase. Conservative agriculture should also be practiced as the over-use of tractors may disrupt biodiversity and natural biological process.

Willingness to pay for agricultural mechanization services by smallholder farmers in Malawi

“…Ninety‐six percent of the sample farmers indicated they wished to obtain transport services for their maize from farm to homestead. A study in Ethiopia also shows that farmers are interested in obtaining transport services for their produce (Workneh et al, 2021). The proportions of farmers that stated the need for transportation services are meager for other crops could be due to the low production quantity.…”

Preharvest and postharvest management practices related to mycotoxin contamination in maize in Ethiopia – a review

“…In Ethiopia, land is mostly prepared with oxen using an ard or breaking plough (locally called 'maresha') and plough to cultivate grains, including maize (Biazin et al, 2011;Goe, 1989;Sime et al, 2015;Workneh et al, 2021). For this purpose, most farmers in the North Eastern part of the country own at least one oxen (Derese et al, 2017).…”