IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/agfoec/v7y2019i1d10.1186_s40100-019-0136-6.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Performance, behaviour and organization of maize trading in Malawi

Author

Listed:
  • Henry Kankwamba

    (Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources (LUANAR))

  • Lukas Kornher

    (University of Bonn)

Abstract

Industry structure and social capital could affect traders, market performance and distribution of economic resources such as food. This study assesses the effect of industry structure and social capital on traders’ profitability and resilience. We use Bayes Model Averaging regression techniques to draw inferences from a random, representative and systematically selected sample of maize traders in the central region of Malawi. We complement our results with key informant prior information from industry experts and literature. Results indicate that at the local market level, few traders dominate but competition increases when we consider the entire district and region. Results also show that interaction with distant traders and brokers is associated with more profitable and resilient businesses. While we find evidence that social capital is positively associated with business profitability, results do not strongly support the hypothesis that other measures of social capital such as tribal and religious affiliation have an effect on traders’ resilience. Noteworthy, as the unit of closeness among traders decreases to family ties, profits tend to increase. This suggests a more group and kin selective evolutionary stable strategy among maize traders.

Suggested Citation

  • Henry Kankwamba & Lukas Kornher, 2019. "Performance, behaviour and organization of maize trading in Malawi," Agricultural and Food Economics, Springer;Italian Society of Agricultural Economics (SIDEA), vol. 7(1), pages 1-20, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:agfoec:v:7:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1186_s40100-019-0136-6
    DOI: 10.1186/s40100-019-0136-6
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1186/s40100-019-0136-6
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1186/s40100-019-0136-6?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marcel Fafchamps & Bart Minten, 2001. "Social Capital and Agricultural Trade," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 83(3), pages 680-685.
    2. Miao, Chao & Coombs, Joseph E. & Qian, Shanshan & Sirmon, David G., 2017. "The mediating role of entrepreneurial orientation: A meta-analysis of resource orchestration and cultural contingencies," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 68-80.
    3. Catherine Laffineur & Saulo Dubard Barbosa & Alain Fayolle & Emeran Nziali, 2017. "Active labor market programs’ effects on entrepreneurship and unemployment," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 49(4), pages 889-918, December.
    4. McKenzie, David & Seynabou Sakho, Yaye, 2010. "Does it pay firms to register for taxes? The impact of formality on firm profitability," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 15-24, January.
    5. Adwin Surja Atmadja & Jen-Je Su & Parmendra Sharma, 2016. "Examining the impact of microfinance on microenterprise performance (implications for women-owned microenterprises in Indonesia)," International Journal of Social Economics, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 43(10), pages 962-981, October.
    6. Jing Cai & Adam Szeidl, 2018. "Interfirm Relationships and Business Performance," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 133(3), pages 1229-1282.
    7. Islam, Md. Mazharul & Habes, Essam M. & Alam, Md. Mahmudul, 2018. "The usage and social capital of mobile phones and their effect on the performance of microenterprise: An empirical study," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 156-164.
    8. Klaus Abbink & Thomas Jayne & Lars Moller, 2011. "The Relevance of a Rules-based Maize Marketing Policy: An Experimental Case Study of Zambia," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(2), pages 207-230.
    9. Yujiro Hayami, 2009. "Social Capital, Human Capital and the Community Mechanism: Toward a Conceptual Framework for Economists," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(1), pages 96-123.
    10. Mas-Colell, Andreu & Whinston, Michael D. & Green, Jerry R., 1995. "Microeconomic Theory," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780195102680.
    11. van Rijn, Fédes & Bulte, Erwin & Adekunle, Adewale, 2012. "Social capital and agricultural innovation in Sub-Saharan Africa," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 112-122.
    12. Richard J. Sexton & Tian Xia, 2018. "Increasing Concentration in the Agricultural Supply Chain: Implications for Market Power and Sector Performance," Annual Review of Resource Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 10(1), pages 229-251, October.
    13. Nicholas J. Sitko & Brian Chisanga & David Tschirley & Thomas S. Jayne, 2018. "An evolution in the middle: examining the rise of multinational investment in smallholder grain trading in Zambia," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 10(2), pages 473-488, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sakketa, Tekalign Gutu, 2022. "Urbanisation and rural development in developing countries: A review of pathways and impacts," IDOS Discussion Papers 5/2022, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Stefan Dimitriadis, 2021. "Social capital and entrepreneur resilience: Entrepreneur performance during violent protests in Togo," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(11), pages 1993-2019, November.
    2. Wright, Austin L. & Sonin, Konstantin & Driscoll, Jesse & Wilson, Jarnickae, 2020. "Poverty and economic dislocation reduce compliance with COVID-19 shelter-in-place protocols," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 180(C), pages 544-554.
    3. Jolian McHardy & Michael Reynolds & Stephen Trotter, 2012. "The Stackelberg Model as a Partial Solution to the Problem of Pricing in a Network," Working Paper series 19_12, Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis.
    4. Janvier D. Nkurunziza, 2005. "Reputation and Credit without Collateral in Africa`s Formal Banking," Economics Series Working Papers WPS/2005-02, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
    5. Stephanie Rosenkranz & Patrick W. Schmitz, 2007. "Can Coasean Bargaining Justify Pigouvian Taxation?," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 74(296), pages 573-585, November.
    6. Sam Z. Njinyah & Simplice A. Asongu, 2023. "Unregistered Firms, Financial Access and Innovation," Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Emerging Economies, Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India, vol. 32(2), pages 307-346, July.
    7. Vadim Borokhov, 2014. "On the properties of nodal price response matrix in electricity markets," Papers 1404.3678, arXiv.org, revised Jan 2015.
    8. Daniel Sutter & Daniel J. Smith, 2017. "Coordination in disaster: Nonprice learning and the allocation of resources after natural disasters," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 30(4), pages 469-492, December.
    9. González-Uribe, Juanita & Reyes, Santiago, 2021. "Identifying and boosting “Gazelles”: Evidence from business accelerators," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(1), pages 260-287.
    10. Lukáš Čechura & Tinoush Jamali Jaghdani, 2021. "Market Imperfections within the European Wheat Value Chain: The Case of France and the United Kingdom," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-21, August.
    11. Hanming Fang & Peter Norman, 2014. "Toward an efficiency rationale for the public provision of private goods," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 56(2), pages 375-408, June.
    12. Gan, Li & Ju, Gaosheng & Zhu, Xi, 2015. "Nonparametric estimation of structural labor supply and exact welfare change under nonconvex piecewise-linear budget sets," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 188(2), pages 526-544.
    13. Peterson, Jeffrey M. & Boisvert, Richard N. & de Gorter, Harry, 1999. "Multifunctionality and Optimal Environmental Policies for Agriculture in an Open Economy," Working Papers 127701, Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management.
    14. Tian, Guoqiang, 2009. "Implementation of Pareto efficient allocations," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1-2), pages 113-123, January.
    15. Ahmad Naimzada & Marina Pireddu, 2019. "The first fundamental theorem of welfare in a general equilibrium evolutionary setting," Working Papers 415, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised 06 Jun 2019.
    16. Gajanan Panchal & Vipul Jain & Naoufel Cheikhrouhou & Matthias Gurtner, 2017. "Equilibrium analysis in multi-echelon supply chain with multi-dimensional utilities of inertial players," Journal of Revenue and Pricing Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 16(4), pages 417-436, August.
    17. Rosemary Mnongya, "undated". "Performance Evaluation Of Industrial Clustering In Tanzania," Review of Socio - Economic Perspectives 202071, Reviewsep.
    18. Gustavo Henrique de Andrade & Miriam Bruhn & David McKenzie, 2016. "A Helping Hand or the Long Arm of the Law? Experimental Evidence on What Governments Can Do to Formalize Firms," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 30(1), pages 24-54.
    19. Aldasoro, Iñaki & Delli Gatti, Domenico & Faia, Ester, 2017. "Bank networks: Contagion, systemic risk and prudential policy," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 164-188.
    20. Gatti, Nicolas & Cecil, Michael & Baylis, Kathy & Estes, Lyndon & Blekking, Jordan & Heckelei, Thomas & Vergopolan, Noemi & Evans, Tom, 2023. "Is closing the agricultural yield gap a “risky” endeavor?," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 208(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:agfoec:v:7:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1186_s40100-019-0136-6. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.