Smallholder Farmers' and Other Agricultural Sector Stakeholders' Priorities for Government Spending: Evidence from Zambia
DOWNLOADDecember 5, 2019 - Nicole M. Mason, Auckland Kuteya, Danielle Resnick, Vincenzina Caputo, Mywish Maredia, Robert Shupp, and Hambulo Ngoma
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EmailNicole M. Mason, Auckland Kuteya, Danielle Resnick, Vincenzina Caputo, Mywish Maredia,Robert Shupp, and Hambulo Ngoma, 2019. Smallholder Farmers' and Other Agricultural Sector Stakeholders' Priorities for Government Spending: Evidence from Zambia. Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy Research Paper 155.
ABSTRACT
Empirical evidence from around the world suggests that public good investments in agricultural research and development (R&D), extension, and rural roads often yield relatively higher returns, while expenditures on private goods like agricultural subsidies often yield relatively lower returns. In contrast, the Zambian government devotes large shares of its agricultural sector spending to subsidies, leaving little money to devote to other agricultural sector programs and investments. No previous studies have attempted to measure Zambian smallholder farmers’ or other stakeholders’ preferences for different types of public expenditures. This paper summarizes the key insights from data on these preferences collected between 2015 and 2019 through four different surveys (the 2015 and 2019 Rural Agricultural Livelihoods Surveys--RALS15 and RALS19; a 2017 E Voucher Survey; and a 2019 stakeholder survey) and two different methodologies (a single open-ended question in RALS15 and RALS19; and the Best Worst Scaling [BWS] method in the E-Voucher survey and stakeholder survey).
