Marenya, P.P., Gebremariam, G. and Rahut, D.B. (2021) ‘Performance of women-managed plots compared to men-managed plots among smallholder maize farmers in western and central Ethiopia’, Journal of Applied Economics, 24(1), pp. 523–540.
The study commenced by explaining gender inequalities in developing countries and their multi factors and consequences, particularly in agrarian societies. According to the author, gender inequality in agricultural activities resulted in reducing women’s access to land, and public services such as extension and reduction in market participation as the net sellers of produce. Women do engage and participate in agricultural activities whereas the proportion of women who are landowners and farm operators is estimated at 22% in 18% of Ethiopia. However, the agricultural yields and productivity of women’s plots are usually less than that of their male counterparts.
With the primary goal of providing evidence-based reasons why yield performance over plots of land managed by women is less performing than that managed by men, the author employed intra-household production data to compare the yield performance of plots under different combinations of multiple agronomic technologies (MATs) disaggregated by who manage the land. The author used a survey method to collect data from the farmers. Using Random sampling,873 households and 1624 maize farmers were selected and participated in this study.
According to the author, female farmers are found to be more productive in farming activity whenever they are given the same access to resources and opportunities equal with males. Thus, women-managed plots had higher yield returns than those managed jointly. On the other hand, the average treatment effect of the adoption of fertilisers and maize legume diversification was estimated to be 1224 kg/ha for women-managed plots, 1414 kg/ha for male-managed plots, and 904 kg/ha for joint-managed plots. The data is also disaggregated by rainfall endowments and gender. Accordingly, plots with rainfall surplus were found to be more productive than plots with rainfall shortage. Coming to the gender aspect, plots managed by women were found to be more productive than plots managed by men in both rainfall endowment scenarios. The study also confirmed that once access to inputs, agronomy, market, and extension are controlled for, women farmers’ productivity is commensurate with that of male farmers.
Generally, the author argued that legal reform by itself will not bring the required change rather autonomous management of agricultural plots will be ensured by prioritising, social norms, and women’s bargaining power. For example, in many rural areas, a larger piece of land (constituting the farm) is often subdivided into separate tiny plots among family members, to be operated individually or jointly. In situations where further sub-division of land and individual titling is not feasible (and only small pieces of land can be shared) among household members, the issue of intra-household bargaining power becomes paramount. Thus, implementing a more targeted approach toward the improvement of women’s access to agricultural innovations is found to be the best mechanism to increase agricultural productivity.