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Economic Analysis of Factors Affecting Farmer Decision Making on Upland Soil Conservation in Lam Dong Province, Vietnam
Dissertation Abstract:
The study was conducted to identify and analyze the factors affecting upland farmers’ decision on adoption of soil conservation technologies. The study utilized primary data collected from 160 randomly selected farm households in four villages in Lam Dong Province.
Upland household’s decision on soil conservation technologies was modeled in a two-stage process: recognition of the erosion effect, and adoption of and investment in the practice of soil conservation. Qualitative response models (logit and tobit) were employed to determine the factors that influence the awareness of farmers on soil erosion, and the adoption of and investment in soil conservation practices.
Ordinary Least Square and Maximum Likelihood estimations were used for crop production associated with soil conservation technologies. Econometric techniques using stochastic frontier methods were performed to estimate level of technical efficiency and allocative efficiency in adoption and non-adoption farms.
Production function parameters were estimated for adoption and non-adoption farms. The results showed that adoption group had higher productivity than nonadoption group.
The frontier function estimates on persimmon production farms implied that the adoption farms were more technically and allocatively efficient than the non-adoption farms. The value of investment in applying soil conservation practices, technical training and education were among the important factors leading to higher efficiency for adopters.
The study proposed a number of policy recommendations to ease the burden of applying of soil conservation technologies. The recommendations included:
• Putting greater emphasis and resources on technical training on soil conservation practices, particularly to farmers among minority groups;
• Setting the economic incentives that motivate farmers to shift to soil conservation technologies;
• Designing and implementing programs to improve food production and food security at the village level; and
• Designing programs for creating awareness among government officials of the net benefits from soil conservation technology, and improving their capability to prepare, promote and implement soil conservation programs and projects.