IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jagris/v12y2022i2p225-d741894.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Unpacking Total Factor Productivity on Dairy Farms Using Empirical Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Kehinde Oluseyi Olagunju

    (Economics Research, Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute, 18a Newforge Lane, Belfast BT9 5PX, UK)

  • Erin Sherry

    (Economics Research, Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute, 18a Newforge Lane, Belfast BT9 5PX, UK)

  • Aurelia Samuel

    (Economics Research, Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute, 18a Newforge Lane, Belfast BT9 5PX, UK)

  • Paul Caskie

    (Economics Research, Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute, 18a Newforge Lane, Belfast BT9 5PX, UK)

Abstract

This study examines the farm-level factors that influence differences in total factor productivity (TFP) on dairy farms. To this end, a fixed-effects regression approach is applied to panel data for dairy farms obtained from the Farm Accountancy Data Network for Northern Ireland over the period of 2005 to 2016. The findings are largely consistent with existing empirical evidence, showing that herd size, milk yield, stocking density, and share of hired labour have a positive and statistically significant impact on TFP, while labour input per cow, purchased feed input per cow, and share of direct payments in total farm output have a negative and statistically significant impact. The more complex relationships, namely age, education, and investment, have been unpacked using interaction terms and nonlinear approximation. The impact of age is negative, and the drag on productivity grows as age increases. Capital investment and education both have a positive impact on farm-level TFP, as well as on their interaction. Policy recommendations on strategies and best practices to help dairy farms tackle productivity constraints are suggested.

Suggested Citation

  • Kehinde Oluseyi Olagunju & Erin Sherry & Aurelia Samuel & Paul Caskie, 2022. "Unpacking Total Factor Productivity on Dairy Farms Using Empirical Evidence," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-13, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jagris:v:12:y:2022:i:2:p:225-:d:741894
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/2/225/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/2/225/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Deep Mukherjee & Boris E. Bravo-Ureta & Albert De Vries, 2013. "Dairy productivity and climatic conditions: econometric evidence from South-eastern United States," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 57(1), pages 123-140, January.
    2. Alejandro Plastina & Sergio H. Lence & Ariel Ortiz‐Bobea, 2021. "How weather affects the decomposition of total factor productivity in U.S. agriculture," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 52(2), pages 215-234, March.
    3. Lajos Baráth & Imre Fertő, 2017. "Productivity and Convergence in European Agriculture," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 68(1), pages 228-248, February.
    4. repec:zwi:journl:v:57:y:2013:i:1:p:123-140 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Shingo Kimura & Johannes Sauer, 2015. "Dynamics of dairy farm productivity growth: Cross-country comparison," OECD Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Papers 87, OECD Publishing.
    6. Grigorios Emvalomatis, 2012. "Productivity Growth in German Dairy Farming using a Flexible Modelling Approach," Journal of Agricultural Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 63(1), pages 83-101, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhu, Ning & Streimikis, Justas & Yu, Zhiqian & Balezentis, Tomas, 2023. "Energy-sustainable agriculture in the European Union member states: Overall productivity growth and structural efficiency," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 87(PA).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Łukasz Kryszak & Thomas Herzfeld, 2021. "One or many European models of agriculture? How heterogeneity influences income creation among farms in the European Union," Agricultural Economics, Czech Academy of Agricultural Sciences, vol. 67(11), pages 445-456.
    2. Jerzy Marzec & Andrzej Pisulewski, 2020. "Pomiar efektywności zróżnicowanych technologicznie gospodarstw rolnych w Unii Europejskiej," Gospodarka Narodowa. The Polish Journal of Economics, Warsaw School of Economics, issue 3, pages 111-137.
    3. S. C. West & A. W. Mugera & R. S. Kingwell, 2022. "The choice of efficiency benchmarking metric in evaluating firm productivity and viability," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 57(2), pages 193-211, April.
    4. Hu, Yue & Liu, Chang & Peng, Jiangang, 2021. "Financial inclusion and agricultural total factor productivity growth in China," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 68-82.
    5. Hutchins, Jared P. & Gong, Yating & Du, Xiaodong, 2021. "The Role of Animal Breeding in Productivity Growth: Evidence from Wisconsin Dairy Farms," 2021 Annual Meeting, August 1-3, Austin, Texas 313882, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    6. Eric Njuki & Boris E Bravo-Ureta & Christopher J O’Donnell, 2018. "A new look at the decomposition of agricultural productivity growth incorporating weather effects," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 13(2), pages 1-21, February.
    7. Cechura, Lukas & Zakova Kroupova, Zdenka & Maly, Michal & Hockmann, Heinrich, 2015. "Scale efficiency in European pork production," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 18(2), pages 51-56.
    8. Reziti, Ioanna, 2019. "Total factor productivity change of agriculture in five Southern European countries," Agricultural Economics Review, Greek Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 0(Issue 2).
    9. repec:ags:aaea22:335579 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Ioannis Skevas, 2019. "A Hierarchical Stochastic Frontier Model for Efficiency Measurement Under Technology Heterogeneity," Journal of Quantitative Economics, Springer;The Indian Econometric Society (TIES), vol. 17(3), pages 513-524, September.
    11. Adamowicz, Mieczysław & Szepeluk, Adam, 2018. "Regional convergence of labour productivity in rural sectors in the context of funds obtained for agriculture from the European Union," Problems of Agricultural Economics / Zagadnienia Ekonomiki Rolnej 276475, Institute of Agricultural and Food Economics - National Research Institute (IAFE-NRI).
    12. repec:blg:reveco:v:69:y:2017:i:6:p:7-17 is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Ioannis Skevas & Grigorios Emvalomatis & Bernhard Brümmer, 2018. "The effect of farm characteristics on the persistence of technical inefficiency: a case study in German dairy farming," European Review of Agricultural Economics, Oxford University Press and the European Agricultural and Applied Economics Publications Foundation, vol. 45(1), pages 3-25.
    14. Dakpo, K Herve & Jeanneaux, Philippe & Latruffe, Laure & Mosnier, Claire & Veysset, Patrick, 2018. "Three decades of productivity change in French beef production: a F€are-Primont index decomposition," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 62(3), July.
    15. Jerzy Marzec & Andrzej Pisulewski, 2021. "Measurement of technical efficiency in the case of heterogeneity of technologies used between firms - Based on evidence from Polish crop farms," Agricultural Economics, Czech Academy of Agricultural Sciences, vol. 67(4), pages 152-161.
    16. Karolina Pawlak & Luboš Smutka & Pavel Kotyza, 2021. "Agricultural Potential of the EU Countries: How Far Are They from the USA?," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-21, March.
    17. Jose A. Perez‐Mendez & David Roibas & Alan Wall, 2019. "The influence of weather conditions on dairy production," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 50(2), pages 165-175, March.
    18. Jarmila Lazíková & Zuzana Lazíková & Ivan Takáč & Ľubica Rumanovská & Anna Bandlerová, 2019. "Technical Efficiency in the Agricultural Business—The Case of Slovakia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(20), pages 1-17, October.
    19. Oranuch Wongpiyabovorn & Alejandro Plastina & John M. Crespi, 2021. "US Agriculture as a Carbon Sink: From International Agreements to Farm Incentives," Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) Publications 21-wp627, Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) at Iowa State University.
    20. Alexander Zorn & Franziska Zimmert, 2022. "Structural change in the dairy sector: exit from farming and farm type change," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 10(1), pages 1-31, December.
    21. Gabriela Pérez Quesada, 2017. "Technical efficiency of dairy farms in Uruguay: a stochastic production frontier analysis," Documentos de Trabajo (working papers) 0517, Department of Economics - dECON.
    22. Skevas, Ioannis, 2024. "Accounting for technology heterogeneity in the measurement of persistent and transient inefficiency," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 137(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jagris:v:12:y:2022:i:2:p:225-:d:741894. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.