Supply Response of Upland Rice in Ogun State of Nigeria: A Producer Panel Approach

Abstract

Several reasons have been proposed to explain the unexpectedly low supply elasticities often found for food crops. This study is unusual in using a farmers' panel approach. This enables a distinction to be made between four different measures of response: realised output, planted hectarage, planned hectarage and ‘hypothetical’ hectarage. The results indicate that the own‐price elasticities of supply are significantly positive. Planned, planted and realised responses are quite close, but are less than the hypothetical responses. The hypothetical elasticities are smaller for price falls than for price increases and they become lower as the harvesting period passes, suggesting contraction of supply of a crop when its price falls and asymmetric response among small‐scale farmers.

Food crop supply in sub-Saharan Africa and climate change

“…The supply responses to price rises can differ from responses to price reductions. Asymmetric response studies generally demonstrate that farmers adapt their supply more readily to prices increases than to price decreases (Olayemi and Oni, 1972;Ngambeki and Idachaba, 1985). Crop supply is usually also influenced by input prices, but it is not necessarily applicable in SSA, as very little capital and other related inputs are used in traditional crop production (Wolman and Fournier, 1987).…”