This paper investigates the roles of human capital and openness in the process of technology diffusion and productivity growth in the Mediterranean agricultural sector. We estimate a nonlinear productivity growth specification that nests the logistic and the confined exponential technology diffusion functional forms, using a panel of nine South Mediterranean countries and five European Union countries for the period 1990 to 2005. The estimation results suggest that the steady state is a balanced growth path, with all backward economies growing at the pace determined by the leading edge. The findings illustrate the positive roles of openness and human capital in facilitating technology diffusion and fostering agricultural growth. We find strong complementary effects between foreign technology embodied in imported capital goods and educational attainment on farming performance.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Find related papers by JEL classification: C23 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Models with Panel Data D24 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Production; Capital and Total Factor Productivity; Capacity O33 - Economic Development, Technological Change, and Growth - - Technological Change - - - Technological Change: Choices and Consequences; Diffusion Processes Q17 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Agriculture in International Trade