Yigezu Atnafe Yigezu

CONTEXT
Farmers in the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region face several interrelated challenges including natural resource depletion, low crop productivity, and food and nutrition insecurity. To address some of these challenges, governments...

The low market participation of pastoral livestock producers is a challenge to the development of a climate-resilient economy in drought-prone areas. Without deliberate and well-designed efforts to transform livestock production into a thriving...

Improving the performance of low-productivity smallholder farmers is a pathway with great potential for reducing poverty and enhancing food security and nutrition in sub-Saharan Africa. Using experimental data from Ethiopia and a mediated stochastic...

Several research and development efforts have been made to ensure food security in
developing countries. Dissemination of improved agricultural technologies was used as the main
avenue through which some increases in food supply have been achieved...

Generally, agricultural production involves several challenges. In the drylands, it is further complicated by weather-related risks and resource degradation. In this paper, we present a case study of the mixed crop-livestock production system in...

Understanding the logic behind farmers' choice of adaptive water management practice is important to appreciate the opportunities and challenges they face and to scale targeted solutions effectively. This paper aims to understand the main drivers of...

In this study, we test the hypothesis that small-scale testing can reduce the risk and
uncertainty of trying new technologies. We conducted a field experiment, in a cluster
randomised control trial setting, to examine whether the availability of...

The advent of improved lentil varieties (ILVs) in the mid-1990s solved the disease problem which almost halted lentil production in Bangladesh. Levels of adoption of ILVs have been documented in the literature, but little is known about their impacts...

Conventional tillage coupled with monocropping and limited recycling of crop residues along with increased pressure from human and livestock population has led to the degradation of the soil, water resources, and the environment in the Middle East...

Pushing yield frontiers of cereals and legumes is becoming increasingly difficult, especially
in drylands. This paper argues and provides empirical evidence that food loss and wastage constitute
a sizeable proportion of the total wheat supply in...

Despite several efforts for its dissemination, adoption of conservation agriculture (CA) in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is low – causing some to wonder if an incremental approach for adoption of its three components would prove...

Conservation agriculture (CA) involving zero tillage, crop diversification, and residue retention
is considered a panacea for several interrelated problems in agricultural production. However, in
the mixed crop-livestock production systems of the...

Low adoption of agricultural technologies slows efforts to increase agricultural productivity and enhance rural livelihoods in developing countries. A large body of literature has sought explanations for the problem, but the focus has been mainly on...

Although many studies have shown that sub-Saharan African countries could increase agricultural productivity and output through better technologies and improved crop varieties, the adoption of yield-enhancing technologies by smallholder farmers in...

In Morocco, the adoption of recent improved wheat varieties is low, casting doubt on whether investments in wheat research are paying off. This paper generates estimates of the returns to the national and international investment in wheat research...

Zero tillage (ZT) is recommended for dryland farming because it enhances retention
of residual soil moisture. However, it is not always clear whether this translates
to an economic advantage over conventional tillage, which helps in controlling
weeds...

Raised beds (RB) are hailed as means to mitigate the problem of excessive irrigation. However, their adoption and impacts in Egypt are not well-documented. This paper is based on survey data collected from a sample of 691 wheat fields drawn from...

Simple Summary: Bone morphogenetic protein 7 (BMP7) is one of the largest secretory signal conductive molecules and is in the TGF-beta superfamily. It plays an important role in the growth and development of hair follicles. We cloned the proximal...

Agricultural research-and-development (R&D) systems generate and disseminate new technologies, aiming to enhance crop and livestock production sustainably. Adoption-impact studies analyze farmer acceptance of these innovations and their impacts to...

International crop‐related research as conducted by the CGIAR uses crop modeling for a variety of purposes. By linking crop models with economic models and approaches, crop model outputs can be effectively used as inputs into socioeconomic modeling...

Current land use trends show an increasing preference for monocropping – mostly a consequence of policies and incentives aimed at enhancing the intensification of cereals. This shift has caused some to question whether legume–cereal rotations can...

Efforts to increase global food supply through increased productivity and intensity of cropping are well documented. However, the literature on measurement of food losses and wastage and techniques to reduce them is scanty. This study aimed at...

In the early 1980s, disease susceptibility in short-season lentil landraces began to limit productivity in areas where relay cropping took place in Bangladesh. Since then, several improved high-yielding lentil varieties, which are resistant to rust...

This article aims at identifying factors that determine market prices of goats and analyse potential mechanisms by which smallholder goat producers could maximize their benefits. Data on 357 farm households and 2103 goat transactions were collected...

Past research found agricultural producers’ conditional responses during the growing season are important adaptations to weather and other stochastic events. Failing to recognize these responses overstates the risks confronting producers and...

This paper argues and provides empirical evidence that trade-offs and/or complementarities are
inherent in technological options that shape the adoption of and land-use decisions in production
systems involving multiple crops in Ethiopia. By applying...

Dual-purpose (DP) management of cereals holds promise to reduce the feed gap and to better integrate crop and livestock systems especially in drylands where forage deficit is severe. However, there is limited information on which cereal species and...

Low and slow adoption of improved agricultural technologies among smallholders often frustrate technology development and promotion efforts in the developing world. That is especially true for technologies requiring high initial investment. This...

This book, Political Economy of the Wheat Sector in Morocco: Seed Systems, Varietal Adoption, and Impacts, documents the studies conducted on the wheat sector in general. It also documents the wheat seed system, its adoption and impacts in Morocco...

This paper provides empirical evidence that improved supplemental irrigation
(ISI) can be justified on both environmental and economic grounds. Results
of a stochastic frontier model which explicitly and simultaneously accounts
for technical...

Supplemental feeding of lambs with forage legumes or grains provides a potential option to increase proportion of prime lambs and profitability in intensive pasture-based lamb production systems. A two-year study in the Central Anatolian Region of...

When evaluated purely on financial grounds, most developmental interventions targeting the livestock sector exhibit a positive impact. This study also provides empirical evidence that a project which provided loans to livestock producers in Syria...

Large-scale mismanagement of natural resources emanating from lack of appropriate policies and reg- ulatory framework is arguably one of the reasons that led to resource degradation and poor livelihoods in many countries in the Middle East and North...

The biophysical benefits of zero tillage (ZT) are well documented in the literature.
However, the literature on its economic benefits, especially in the context
of small and medium-scale farmers in the temperate developing world is
scanty. Using a...

This study employs the Heckman selection model to identify factors affecting the adoption of zero tillage (ZT) and measure its yield, income, and consumption impacts among Syrian wheat producers. A stochastic production frontier model is also...

Low adoption levels of agricultural technologies undermine the impacts of national and international agricultural research. Using a combination of an ordered logit and Heckman selection models and a case study from an out-scaling program for a barley...

Participants at the international conference on policies for water and food security in the dry areas, held in June 2013, agreed that, given the fast pace of depletion of groundwater, the issue of water valuation in the dry areas is no longer one of...

The absence of adequate land leveling coupled with the ill designed traditional furrow irrigation systems
and the poor condition of drainage structures in most Syrian farms are leading to over-irrigation. A stochastic
production frontier and...

ntegrated pest management has proved cost-effective in coping with crop pests. This article identifies characteristics of pests, controls and economic incentives that may make the development of an integrated joint pest management (IJPM) strategy –...