IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/apecpp/v35y2013i2p322-340..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Editor's choice Addressing the "Wicked Problem" of Input Subsidy Programs in Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Jacob Ricker-Gilbert
  • Thomas Jayne
  • Gerald Shively

Abstract

This article reviews and critically assesses evidence on input subsidy programs implemented in selected countries over the past decade in Africa. We believe that input subsidies should be considered wicked problems because of the indeterminacy and difficulty surrounding how they are evaluated. Main findings from the current body of literature are that input subsidies provide some measurable but relatively small positive benefit to recipient households' well-being. In addition, most studies find that subsidized inputs crowd out commercial input purchases, mitigating the extent to which subsidy programs contribute to total fertilizer use and crop production. African governments may wish to carefully consider the benefits and distributional effects of input subsidy programs relative to other uses of scarce public resources.

Suggested Citation

  • Jacob Ricker-Gilbert & Thomas Jayne & Gerald Shively, 2013. "Editor's choice Addressing the "Wicked Problem" of Input Subsidy Programs in Africa," Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 35(2), pages 322-340.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:apecpp:v:35:y:2013:i:2:p:322-340.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/aepp/ppt001
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

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


    Cited by:

    1. Saenz, Mariana & Thompson, Eric, 2017. "Gender and Policy Roles in Farm Household Diversification in Zambia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 152-169.
    2. Magdalena PROCZEK & Marta GARBARCZYK, 2023. "Wicked Problems And The Design Thinking Method As A Tool To Solve These Problems. The Case Alien Project," Eastern European Journal for Regional Studies (EEJRS), Center for Studies in European Integration (CSEI), Academy of Economic Studies of Moldova (ASEM), vol. 9(1), pages 21-31, June.
    3. Adam M. Komarek & Siwa Msangi, 2019. "Effect of changes in population density and crop productivity on farm households in Malawi," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 50(5), pages 615-628, September.
    4. Sylvester Amoako Agyemang & Tomáš Ratinger & Miroslava Bavorová, 2022. "The Impact of Agricultural Input Subsidy on Productivity: The Case of Ghana," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 34(3), pages 1460-1485, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:oup:apecpp:v:35:y:2013:i:2:p:322-340.. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/aaeaaea.html .

    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.