Economic Analysis of Smallholder Maize Producers: Empirical Evidence From Helmand, Afghanistan

Elham, Hamidullah; Zhou, Jiajun; Diallo, Mouhamadou Foula; Ahmad, Shakeel; Zhou, De

doi:10.5539/jas.v12n3p153

Cited by 4 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 33 publications

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“…Farming households have significant potential to increase food security by ensuring the accessibility of food through production, decreasing food costs through an increased food supply, and generating income [24]. However, Afghanistan faces problems in reaching food security: their production remains low and hampered by several elements such as a lack of agricultural inputs, credit access, extension service, farmer organization, and market access [25][26][27]. Additionally, the appearance of new problems, such as conflict, increases household vulnerability to food insecurity through deep economic recessions, unemployment, increased inflation, and eroded finances for social security and health [17,19].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Food Insecurity and Related Factors among Farming Families in Takhar Region, Afghanistan

Samim

Stępień

et al. 2021

Sustainability

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Improved food security remains a major challenge for policymakers in Afghanistan. The objective of this study is to investigate the prevalence and drivers of food insecurity among farming households in the Takhar region of Afghanistan. Household questionnaire survey datasets were obtained from 262 farmers via multi-stage sampling across four districts. The Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) was constructed to assess the prevalence of food insecurity, and an ordered probit econometric model was used to identify the factors influencing the prevalence rates in farming families. The findings indicate that 66.79% of the farming households were food insecure, whilst 30.53% were severely food insecure. After adjustment of socio-economic and demographic characteristics of families, the ordered probit results reveals that household head education, dependency ratio, farm income, access to non-agricultural income, livestock unit, group membership, borrowing, farm diseases, flood, and war significantly influenced farming households’ food insecurity in the study area. Our findings highlight the urgent requirement for policies and initiatives to support farmers to improve their overall food security. Such strategies should focus on introducing improved farming techniques, enhancing farmer education levels, livestock development programs, building and empowering farmers groups, creating credit access to households, and providing humanitarian food support.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Food Insecurity and Related Factors among Farming Families in Takhar Region, Afghanistan

Samim

Stępień

et al. 2021

Sustainability

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“…3 indicated the deterioration of Afghanistan's capability to meet its own population's demand for food crops in the last 40 years. Therefore, due to the slower increase in yield of major cereal crops (wheat, rice, and maize), two decades of civil strife and political upheaval, prolonged drought (from 1998 to 2002), poor agricultural infrastructure, and high inefficiencies (technical, allocative and economic), the quantity of cereal produced was below the actual need for local consumption in Afghanistan [4,16,49,50] Table (2).…”

Section: Cereal Production and Consumptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Agriculture provides income, food security, and employment opportunities for more than 80% of the Afghanistan population and 44 % of Afghanistan's households [3]. Therefore, Agriculture is still linked with low performance and is not adequate to produce food for the populace [4]. Besides, subsistence Agriculture dominates Afghanistan's Agriculture.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The current deficiency of milled rice has resulted in the import of 270250 million metric tons (MMT) annually [21]. Maize is the third-largest grain crop in Afghanistan; it plays a key role in Afghanistan's economy of development, where the inhabitants are quite malnourished [4]. The majority of people use an alternative source of food when conventional wheat and rice are scarce.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The productivity of maize fluctuated and is declining in recent years due to climate change [25]. In 2017, maize production in Afghanistan was 173912 tons, a 44% reduction from the maize production of 20247 tons in 2017 [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Assessment of Cereal Self-sufficiency and Food Balance Projection in Afghanistan

Samim

et al. 2021

AJAEES

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Aims: Afghanistan is overwhelmed with food insecurity, thus severe food shortages in which a large percentage of the population lacks reliable access to food supplies. Cereals such as wheat, rice, and maize play a vital role in the country's food security due to their importance in terms of consumption and production quantity. This paper estimates cereal self-sufficiency and then makes a food balance forecast of the three major food crops - wheat, rice, and maize - cultivated in Afghanistan over six-decades (1979 – 2030). Methodology: Descriptive statistics, ARIMA model, and coarse metric technique were employed to analyze the data from the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), United States Department of Agriculture PSD Database (USDA), and United Nations World Population Division databases to determine cereal self-sufficiency and food balance forecast. Results Econometric analysis demonstrated that (1) Afghanistan is not yet self-sufficient in meeting grain consumption. (2) The production and consumption ratio declined from 0.9 to 0.55 from 1979 to 2030. (3) The gap of theoretical food imbalance will increase, and by the year 2030, cereal production will likely be sufficient for only 49.8 percentage of inhabitants, leaving a high shortage equivalent to the amount required by 24.4 million people. (4) Per capita cereal production will possibly decrease from 120.8 kg to 95.4 kg per person between 2018 and 2030. Conclusion: By evaluating the quantitative food balance and the growing population change, this study presents an analysis of the emerging threat to Afghanistan's food security. Therefore, we recommended that the Afghanistan government should increase the size of public agricultural expenditure, improve the level of agriculture infrastructure, increase the cultivation area of cereals, and continue to introduce policy to achieve higher yield.

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Assessment of Cereal Self-Sufficiency and Food Balance Projection in Afghanistan

Samim¹,

Hu²,

Wen³

2021

Preprint

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Afghanistan is overwhelmed with food insecurity that is a large percentage of the population lacks reliable access to food supplies. Grains play a vital role in the country's food security due to their importance in terms of consumption and production quantity. This paper estimates cereal self-sufficiency and then makes a food balance forecast of the three major food crops cultivated in Afghanistan over six-decades. Descriptive statistics and coarse metric techniques were employed to determine cereal self-sufficiency and food balance forecast. The econometric analysis demonstrated that (1) Afghanistan is not yet self-sufficient in meeting grain consumption, and the production and consumption ratio declined from 0.9 to 0.55 from 1979 to 2030. (2) The gap of theoretical food imbalance will increase, and by the year 2030, cereal production will likely be sufficient for only 49.8 percentage of inhabitants, leaving a high shortage equivalent to the amount required by 24.4 million people. By evaluating the quantitative food balance and the growing population change, this study presents an analysis of the emerging threat to Afghanistan's food security and suggests a solution for food security, should increase the size of public agricultural expenditure, improve the level of agriculture infrastructure, and continue to introduce a policy to achieve higher yield.

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Economic Analysis of Smallholder Maize Producers: Empirical Evidence From Helmand, Afghanistan

Cited by 4 publications

References 33 publications

Food Insecurity and Related Factors among Farming Families in Takhar Region, Afghanistan

Food Insecurity and Related Factors among Farming Families in Takhar Region, Afghanistan

Assessment of Cereal Self-sufficiency and Food Balance Projection in Afghanistan

Assessment of Cereal Self-Sufficiency and Food Balance Projection in Afghanistan

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