Determinants of Maize Commercialization among Smallholder Farmers: The Case of Nunu Kumba District, East Wollega Zone, Oromia Regional State, Western Ethiopia

This study were aimed at analyzemaize producer’s household level of market participation, determinants of maize producer household’s degree of market participationand determinants of maize producer households level of commercialization in the study area. The study used a cross sectional data collected from 345 randomly selected households from four kebeles through semi-structured household questionnaires. Tobit model was used to analyze determinants of level of market participation of maize producers and ordered logit model was used to assess the factors affecting household maize commercialization.Based on Tobit result family size and distance from nearest market affected market participation of maize producers significantly and negatively, and land allocated for maize, access to improved seed, raw planting, amount of credit received and membership of cooperative affected market participation of maize producers significantly and positively. The result of ordered logit revealed that Marital status, Household size, distance from nearest market and age of household head significantly and negatively affected level of commercialization. Whereas, Household labor supply, access to improved seed, amount of fertilizer, credit amount, and household head education class positively and significantly affected level of commercialization. Policies that give more emphasis to family planning, improving and strengthening rural infrastructure, strengthening institutional arrangement like cooperatives have paramount implications to speed up the move from subsistence and semi commercial towards commercial oriented production.