Analysis of the Technical Efficiency of Small-holder Cocoyam Farms in Ondo State, Nigeria

This study carried out an analysis of the technical efficiency of cocoyam production among small scale farmers in Ondo State, Nigeria, and identified some socio-economic factors, which influence productive efficiency. The data used were generated from a farm survey involving fifty cocoyam farmers using combinations of purposive and random sampling techniques. Descriptive statistics, stochastic production frontier model as well as inefficiency model were applied to primary data. A Cobb Douglas production function was used to represent the production frontier of the cocoyam farms. The results indicate that the technical efficiencies of the farmers was found to be fairly high with a mean of 84.3% which suggests that average cocoyam output falls 15.7% short of the maximum possible level. The study further observed that only education was positively correlated and significantly influenced the level of technical efficiency of the farmers while increase in the other socio-economic variables, household size, off-farm income, access to credit and farming experience led to decrease in technical efficiency.