@article{UllahMahmoodZebetal.2020, author = {Ullah, Ayat and Mahmood, Nasir and Zeb, Alam and K{\"a}chele, Harald}, title = {Factors Determining Farmers' Access to and Sources of Credit: Evidence from the Rain-Fed Zone of Pakistan}, series = {Agriculture}, volume = {10}, journal = {Agriculture}, number = {12}, publisher = {MDPI}, issn = {2077-0472}, doi = {10.3390/agriculture10120586}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-3419}, pages = {13}, year = {2020}, abstract = {This study investigates the factors that affect farmers' access to agricultural credit and its role in adopting improved agricultural technologies in the rain-fed zone of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Pakistan. Using logistic models, we assess and compare the relative role of farmers' socioeconomic attributes in their access to credit and adoption strategies. The results indicate a moderate positive association between farmers' access to agricultural credit and their adoption of improved agricultural technologies. The binary logit model's results indicate that farmers with a large-sized farm, high farm income, better access to information, and large physical asset ownership showed a positive influence on credit access. However, farming experience showed a negative effect on farmers' access to agricultural credit. Regarding farmers' credit sources, this study found that asset-rich farmers with more farming experience and better access to information relied more on banks than on input providers and informal credit sources. Similarly, older farmers with more education, larger farm sizes and high farm income were more likely to have borrowed from input providers than banks. We conclude that the role of the effective provision of information on credit and agricultural technology is imperative and requires separate policies that are specifically aimed at different groups of farmers with different socioeconomic and farm-related characteristics.}, language = {en} } @article{MahmoodArshadKaecheleetal.2020, author = {Mahmood, Nasir and Arshad, Muhammad and K{\"a}chele, Harald and Shahzad, Muhammad Faisal and Ullah, Ayat and Mueller, Klaus}, title = {Fatalism, Climate Resiliency Training and Farmers' Adaptation Responses: Implications for Sustainable Rainfed-Wheat Production in Pakistan}, series = {Sustainability}, volume = {12}, journal = {Sustainability}, number = {4}, publisher = {MDPI}, issn = {2071-1050}, doi = {10.3390/su12041650}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-3338}, pages = {21}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Climate change is a severe threat to the agricultural sector in general and to rainfed farming in particular. The aim of this study was to investigate the factors that can potentially affect the adaptation process against climate change. This study focused on wheat farmers and farming systems in the rainfed agroecological zone of Pakistan. Farmers' data related to climate change fatalism, the availability of climate-specific extension services, socioeconomic and institutional variables, and farm characteristics were collected. A logit model to assess farmers' decisions to adopt an adaptation measure and a multinomial logit model to assess their choice of various adaptation measures were used. The results showed that fatalistic farmers were unlikely to implement climate change adaptation measures. The variables related to the climate-specific extension services, including farmers' participation in training on climate-resilient crop farming and the availability of mobile communication-based advisory services, had highly significant and positive impacts on farmers' decisions and their choice of adaptation measures. Input market access and tractor ownership also had positive and significant impacts on farmers' decisions to adapt and their choice of adaptation measures. This study highlights the need to improve rainfed-wheat farmers' education levels to change their fatalistic attitudes towards climate change. Furthermore, government action is needed to provide climate-specific extension services to ensure sustainable production levels that will ultimately lead to food and livelihood security under a changing climate.}, language = {en} } @article{UllahArshadKaecheleetal.2020, author = {Ullah, Ayat and Arshad, Muhammad and K{\"a}chele, Harald and Zeb, Alam and Mahmood, Nasir and M{\"u}ller, Klaus}, title = {Socio-economic analysis of farmers facing asymmetric information in inputs markets: evidence from the rainfed zone of Pakistan}, series = {Technology in Society}, volume = {63}, journal = {Technology in Society}, number = {101405}, publisher = {Elsevier}, issn = {1879-3274}, doi = {10.1016/j.techsoc.2020.101405}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-7235}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Information asymmetry plays an important role in the non-adoption of modern agricultural inputs like improved seeds, pesticides and fertilizers etc. Therefore, this study investigated the role of farmers' socio-economic attributes and farm level characteristics in avoiding asymmetry of information in agricultural input markets (i.e. exaggerated prices and low quality). The approach captures the farm level heterogeneity and complexity that may help the authorities in strengthening existing market regulations to control price and quality disparities. We analysed 395 randomly selected farm households using multinomial logit model. We found that farmers with large landholding size are less likely to face quality and more likely to face price information asymmetry. Farmers with higher education, more physical assets and better access to other sources of information are less likely to face both quality and price information asymmetry. Borrowers as compared to purchasers are more likely to face information asymmetry on prices of agricultural inputs. Non-adopters of improved agricultural technologies are more suspicious of information asymmetry than adopters. The paper thus provides evidence that the socio-economic dynamics of information asymmetry can have an important influence on wide spread adoption of technology. Paying more attention to farm level heterogeneity and complexity would help to develop general market management plan and improve the adoption of technology by farmers.}, language = {en} } @article{UllahArshadKaecheleetal.2020, author = {Ullah, Ayat and Arshad, Muhammad and K{\"a}chele, Harald and Khan, Ayesha and Mahmood, Nasir and M{\"u}lle, Klaus}, title = {Information asymmetry, input markets, adoption of innovations and agricultural land use in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan}, series = {Land Use Policy}, volume = {90}, journal = {Land Use Policy}, publisher = {Elsevier}, issn = {0264-8377}, doi = {10.1016/j.landusepol.2019.104261}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-7240}, year = {2020}, abstract = {This paper presents empirical evidence on the effects of information asymmetry in input markets on the adoption of innovations and agricultural land use in rainfed districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Farmers' input market integration may contribute to innovation and adoption among farmers, which may in turn positively influence the sustainable use of agricultural land. To examine this hypothesis, we conducted a study of farmers and input providers to assess the potential constraints on quality inputs, prices, and extension information. We used a multistage random sampling technique to collect data from 395 respondents. We then compared differences among adopters and non-adopters using the Mann-Whitney U test and Mood's median test. Our results indicate that there is a significant difference between the adopters and non-adopters when considering their perceptions of asymmetric market information. Non-adopters are suspicious of exaggerated prices, the non-availability of price lists, adulteration of agricultural inputs, unbalanced input weight and the supply of low-quality alternate commodities (e.g., fertilizers and pesticides) in place of the recommended commodities in the markets. Our results call for the reformulation and implementation of appropriate policies to ensure transparent and equal information sharing among farmers engaged in input markets and for the provision of timely and quality inputs assured by regulatory checks and price checks. Free availability of information on innovations and appropriate oversight over markets appear not only to motivate farmers to adopt agricultural technologies but also to influence more sustainable land use practices.}, language = {en} } @article{MahmoodArshadKaecheleetal.2020, author = {Mahmood, Nasir and Arshad, Muhammad and K{\"a}chele, Harald and Ullah, Ayat and M{\"u}ller, Klaus}, title = {Economic efficiency of rainfed wheat farmers under changing climate: evidence from Pakistan}, series = {Environmental Science and Pollution Research}, journal = {Environmental Science and Pollution Research}, number = {27}, publisher = {Springer Nature}, issn = {1614-7499}, doi = {10.1007/s11356-020-09673-5}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:eb1-opus-7287}, pages = {34453 -- 34467}, year = {2020}, abstract = {Rainfed wheat farming directly depends upon climatic indicators and is mostly at the mercy of climatic extremes. This study analyzed the relationship between the economic efficiency of rainfed wheat farmers and indicators of climate variability in Pakistan employing a two-stage methodological framework. We used farm household level crop input-output and management data and secondary data on climate. In the first stage, a stochastic production frontier (SPF) approach was used to calculate economic efficiency. Then, in the second stage, the calculated economic efficiency scores were regressed against the temperature threshold, temperature anomaly, and total rainfall, in addition to socioeconomic, institutional, and farm variables, using OLS and quantile regression models. The results showed that temperature anomaly and the number of days when temperatures exceed 30 °C have negative and significant impacts on the economic efficiency of rainfed wheat farmers. Total rainfall showed positive and significant impacts across both OLS and quantile regression models. Further, we modeled a novel and very important variable in the context of rainfed wheat production in Pakistan, that is, farmers' participation in trainings in climate-resilient crop farming. This variable showed a positive and highly significant impact on economic efficiency of wheat farmers across all regression models. Our findings call for important policy implications, including developing up-to-date climate resilient adaptation strategies that are particularly focused on rainfed wheat farming. Establishing strong linkages between extension departments and rainfed wheat farmers could help sustain and improve the efficiency of rainfed wheat farmers and hence food and livelihood security.}, language = {en} }