Resource Productivity among Small Scale Maize-Cowpea Farmers in South West, Nigeria: A Translog Function Approach

This study assessed the productivity of small-scale maize-cowpea farmers in South-Western Nigeria. One hundred and eighty respondents were selected using a multistage sampling technique. Primary data were collected through the administration of a well-structured questionnaire and analysed using a combination of descriptive statistics, budgeting analysis, stochastic frontier translog cost and production function Analysis and multiple regression model. Maximum Likelihood Estimates of the Stochastic Frontier Translog Production Function results showed that the coefficients of labour, agrochemicals, farm size and seed had significant effect on the technical efficiency of maize-cowpea farmers in the study area. Most of the interaction terms among the second order coefficients significantly influenced the technical efficiency. Maximum Likelihood Estimates of the Stochastic Frontier Translog Cost showed that the price of agrochemicals, price of implements, and price of labour had significant effect on the total cost of production. The return to scale was 0.86 indicating that the maize-cowpea farmers were operating at positive decreasing returns to scale. The results of allocative efficiency measurement showed that the allocative efficiency varied widely across maize-cowpea production, ranging between 0.41 and 1.00 with the mean of 74% implying that, in the short run, there is possibility of increasing allocative efficiency in maize-cowpea production in the study area by 26% if the farmers would adopt the technology and production techniques currently used by the most efficient farmer. Arising from the findings of the study, some recommendations were made for increased productive efficiency and income of maize-cowpea farmers.