The Paradigm of Agricultural Efficiency and its Implication on Food Security in Africa: What Does Meta-analysis Reveal?

Abstract

The study investigates whether African agricultural efficiency levels have been improving or not and what drives them over the years based on 442 frontier studies using meta-regression analysis. The results show that the mean efficiency estimates from studies decrease significantly as year of survey in the primary study increases. Also studies published in Journals, with parametric specification and with panel data produced significantly higher efficiency estimates, while those with a focus on grain crops reported significantly lower efficiency estimates. Other results show that education, followed by experience, extension, and credit are the major drivers of agricultural efficiency levels in Africa.

agriculture; efficiency; meta-analysis; food security; fractional regression; Africa;