IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/wp-2025-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

How reliable are national accounts estimates of agricultural output?

Author

Listed:
  • Sam Jones
  • Marcelo Mucocana

Abstract

Measurement errors in macroeconomic aggregates such as GDP have been widely lamented, particularly in low-income contexts. This study investigates the reliability of one component of national accounts, agricultural sector output. Focusing first on the case of Mozambique, we use a series of 12 harmonized national agricultural micro-surveys to construct estimates of gross annual output in the sector. Compared to corresponding national accounts values for the period 2002-20, the micro-survey estimates are about 50% lower.

Suggested Citation

  • Sam Jones & Marcelo Mucocana, 2025. "How reliable are national accounts estimates of agricultural output?," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2025-7, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/Publications/Working-paper/PDF/wp2025-7-how-reliable-national-accounts-estimates-agricultural-output.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Espen Beer Prydz & Dean Jolliffe & Umar Serajuddin, 2022. "Disparities in Assessments of Living Standards Using National Accounts and Household Surveys," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 68(S2), pages 385-420, December.
    2. Kelly, Valerie & Hopkins, Jane & Reardon, Thomas & Crawford, Eric, "undated". "Improving The Measurement And Analysis Of African Agricultural Productivity: Promoting Complementarities Between Micro And Macro Data," Food Security International Development Policy Syntheses 272257, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Wollburg,Philip Randolph & Hallegatte,Stephane & Mahler,Daniel Gerszon, 2023. "The Climate Implications of Ending Global Poverty," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10318, The World Bank.
    2. Yao, Becatien H. & Shanoyan, Aleksan, "undated". "Could mobile money applications improve farm productivity? Insights from rural Mozambique," 2018 Annual Meeting, August 5-7, Washington, D.C. 274225, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    3. Traub, Lulama Ndibongo & Jayne, Thomas S., 2004. "The Effects of Market Reform on Maize Marketing Margins in South Africa," Food Security International Development Working Papers 54570, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    4. Ayala Wineman & C. Leigh Anderson & Travis W. Reynolds & Pierre Biscaye, 2019. "Methods of crop yield measurement on multi-cropped plots: Examples from Tanzania," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 11(6), pages 1257-1273, December.
    5. Wu, Haoyu & Atamanov, Aziz & Bundervoet, Tom & Paci, Pierella, 2024. "Is economic growth less welfare enhancing in Africa? Evidence from the last forty years," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    6. Benson, Todd & Fermont, Anneke, 2011. "Estimating yield of food crops grown by smallholder farmers: A review in the Uganda context," IFPRI discussion papers 1097, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    7. Maredia, Mywish K. & Howard, Julie A. & Boughton, Duncan & Naseem, Anwar & Wanzala, Maria N. & Kajisa, Kei, 1999. "Increasing Seed System Efficiency in Africa: Concepts, Strategies and Issues," Food Security International Development Working Papers 54578, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    8. Mahler, Daniel Gerszon & Schoch, Marta & Lakner, Christoph & Nguyen, Minh Cong, 2025. "Predicting Income Distributions from Almost Nothing," Policy Research Working Paper Series 11034, The World Bank.
    9. Mather, David & Donovan, Cynthia & Jayne, Thomas S. & Weber, Michael T. & Chapoto, Antony & Mazhangara, Edward & Mghenyi, Elliot W. & Bailey, Linda & Yoo, Kyeongwon & Yamano, Takashi, 2004. "A Cross-Country Analysis of Household Response to Adult Mortality in Rural Sub-Saharan Africa: Implications for HIV/AIDS Mitigation and Rural Development Policies," Food Security International Development Policy Syntheses 11322, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    10. World Bank, 2024. "Poverty, Prosperity, and Planet Report 2024," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 42211.
    11. Kerr,Andrew Nicholas & Zondi,Mxolisi, 2024. "Measuring the Upper Tail of the Income and Wealth Distributions," Policy Research Working Paper Series 10836, The World Bank.
    12. Anna Christine Durante & Pamela Lapitan & David Megill & Lakshman Nagraj Rao, 2018. "Improving Paddy Rice Statistics Using Area Sampling Frame Technique," ADB Economics Working Paper Series 565, Asian Development Bank.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:unu:wpaper:wp-2025-7. 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: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.html .

    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.