Girma Haile
Department of Economics, Jimma University, Ethiopia.
Heliyon. 2019 Mar 28;5(3):e01322. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2019.e01322. eCollection 2019 Mar.
This paper was conducted to estimate technical efficiency in milk production of dairy farmers in central zone of Tigray National Regional State using stochastic frontier production function approach. Cross-sectional data collected from 163 dairy farmer households was used in the analysis. The result shows that the average technical efficiency of sampled dairy farmer households is about 63.7%. It also shows that labor input by households and average amount of daily cost of crop residue/byproduct do not influence amount of milk produced when stochastic frontier and inefficiency effects are estimated in combination. The estimates of coefficients of other explanatory variables of stochastic frontier production function (i.e. number of lactating cows, average daily cost of purchased supplements, average daily health/veterinary expenditure and average amount of water consumed daily) are found to influence amount of milk produced positively. From the explanatory variables incorporated in inefficiency model sex of household head, extension contact and households off farm income do not influence inefficiency of dairy farmer households while age of household head, years of education of the household head and cattle size are found to influence inefficiency of dairy farmer households negatively. Age squared of household head and household sizes influence inefficiency of dairy farmer households positively. Thus, it can be concluded that by improving dairy farmers' access to education, family planning program and improving bureaucratic environment in providing extension services it is possible to increase amount of milk produced.
本文采用随机前沿生产函数方法，旨在估算提格雷民族地区州中部地区奶农的牛奶生产技术效率。分析中使用了从163个奶农家庭收集的横截面数据。结果表明，抽样奶农家庭的平均技术效率约为63.7%。研究还表明，在综合估计随机前沿和无效率效应时，家庭劳动力投入以及作物残渣/副产品的日均成本不会影响产奶量。随机前沿生产函数的其他解释变量（即泌乳奶牛数量、购买补充剂的日均成本、日均健康/兽医支出以及每日平均用水量）的系数估计值被发现对产奶量有正向影响。在纳入无效率模型的解释变量中，户主性别、推广服务接触和家庭非农业收入不会影响奶农家庭的无效率，而户主年龄、户主受教育年限和牛群规模被发现对奶农家庭的无效率有负面影响。户主年龄的平方和家庭规模对奶农家庭的无效率有正向影响。因此，可以得出结论，通过改善奶农接受教育的机会、计划生育项目以及改善提供推广服务时的官僚环境，有可能提高产奶量。
