Analysis of the Technical Efficiency of Rubber Latex Exploitation in Edo State, Nigeria

This study investigated the technical efficiency of rubber latex exploitation in Southern Nigeria. Data were collected on 100 rubber tappers obtained through the use of structured questionnaires which were randomly administered. Data collected were analysed using descriptive statistics and stochastic frontier production function analysis. Results show that a mean of 387 trees were tapped/ day with 41.69 and 4,478.46 L/man/day annually, respectively. Tappers were literate and had one form of formal education or the other. The technical efficiency effects are highly significant, implying that the traditional production function model is inadequate for the analysis of rubber latex production in the study area. The total elasticity of the production frontier was 1.56 and showed increasing returns to scale and in stage 1 of the production function. There was considerable variation in the technical efficiency of tappers where 66.67% operated below the mean technical efficiency of 0.80. School and training increase the technical efficiency of the respondents. The use of improved clones, exotic clones have positive and significant effect on rubber latex at p>0.01 and p>0.05, respectively.