Technical Efficiency of Wheat Farms Under Irrigated Conditions in Central Sindh, Pakistan

Abstract

T he agriculture sector plays a significant role in the economy of Pakistan which gives 22.2 percent of GDP and occupies 42.3 percent of the labour force (GoP, 2023). Wheat is grown highly in Pakistan on a subsistence basis for home utilization (Razzaq et al., 2023). On average, the households sustain 12.55 percent of their monthly spending on wheat grain and wheat flour (GoP, 2017). The wheat production in Pakistan stood at 27.634 million tonnes in 2022 (GoP, 2023), while the per capita consumption of Abstract | The province of Sindh has almost 38 percent of its fertile land under wheat crop, and it is one of the main dietary foods of the indigenous population in comparison to other grains, fish, chicken, and meat. A total of 300 farmers were interviewed, therefore 150 farmers from each district Naushehro Feroze and Benazirabad were recorded. In this study, the Cobb-Douglas stochastic production frontier approach was employed for examining the technical efficiency and inefficiency factors in wheat production. The results indicated that the improvement in wheat production is due to the preferable utilization of land and practices used in cultivation.Where results denote that the wheat yields can be enhanced up to 0.275 percent by applying one percent more fertilizer in kilograms in wheat cultivation. Wheat farms were 87 percent commercially efficient, which indicates a great potential to enhance efficiency in the resources used in the productivity of wheat. It is evident that efficient usage of resources could add Rs.594.77 ($4.10) million of revenue each year to the economy. The research is based on and derived from wheat production, which is only for a single crop among various other crops. These findings would be quite useful in developing a precise policy for major food crops in Pakistan. These facts would support policy developers to divide resources with equal allocation between agricultural and services sectors while keeping numerous crops within the agricultural sector in the same consideration.