Analysis of production, socio-economic and institutional factors affecting technical efficiency of smallholder banana producers in Kirinyaga central sub-county, Kenya.

Abstract

Banana provides food, nutrition security and income for most households and is fourth most popular food crop in the world after wheat, maize and rice. Despite its significance, full potential of banana production in Kenya remains unexploited by smallholder farmers due to low technical efficiency especially in utilization of farming inputs due to production, socio-economic and institutional issues among others. In Kirinyaga County, the actual banana production is at 4-18 tonnes per acre against the potential of 30-40 tonnes. Despite the limited supply of resources for production, attainment of highest possible levels of technical efficiency is key to achieving sufficiency in banana farming. The study analyzed the effects of production, socio-economic and institutional factors on technical efficiency among smallholder banana producers in Kirinyaga Central Sub-County, Kenya. A cross-sectional research design was used. Questionnaire was administered randomly to 402 respondents selected using multi-stage sampling technique and data analyzed using Stata version 17 and SPSS version 25. Descriptive statistics described the production, socio-economic and institutional factors. A stochastic frontier analysis approach was used to model the efficiency levels using Cobb - Douglas functional form estimated using the maximum likelihood technique. The study showed that technical efficiency varied between 0.93% to 95.45% and average technical efficiency of 83.14%. The study found that manure and planting materials had positive effects on technical efficiency whereas land size had negative impact. The findings established that age of decision maker and size of the household had negative effects whereas education, experience, farmer group membership and market access had positive effects on technical efficiency. The study advises persons with high levels of education to get into banana farming because smallholder farmers with greater levels of education demonstrated high levels of production efficiency. Additionally, to improve efficiencies, farmer group development and membership are encouraged and also extension services made more accessible.