Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?

This paper revisits the decades-old puzzle of the inverse plot-size productivity relationship, which states that land productivity decreases as plot size increases. Existing empirical studies on the inverse plot-size productivity relationship defin...

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Main Authors:	Desiere, Sam, Jolliffe, Dean
Format:	Working Paper
Language:	English en_US
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2017
Subjects:	LAND USE AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY PLOT SIZE CROP YIELDS
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/119781498874101671/Land-productivity-and-plot-size-is-measurement-error-driving-the-inverse-relationship http://hdl.handle.net/10986/27638

id	okr-10986-27638
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-276382021-06-08T14:42:47Z Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship? Desiere, Sam Jolliffe, Dean LAND USE AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY PLOT SIZE CROP YIELDS This paper revisits the decades-old puzzle of the inverse plot-size productivity relationship, which states that land productivity decreases as plot size increases. Existing empirical studies on the inverse plot-size productivity relationship define land productivity or yields as self-reported production divided by plot size. This paper considers an alternative approach to estimating yields based on crop cuts. The crop-cut method entails measuring and harvesting randomly selected subplots by trained technicians, and is recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization for the accurate measurement of crop production. Using data representative of rural Ethiopia, the analysis indicates that the inverse relationship is strong when based on self-reported production, but disappears when based on crop-cut estimates. The inference from these findings is that the inverse relationship is an artifact of systematic overreporting of production by farmers on small plots, and underreporting on larger plots. The paper also discusses how rejecting the inverse plot-size productivity relationship has significant implications for the inverse farm-size productivity relationship. 2017-07-19T17:04:51Z 2017-07-19T17:04:51Z 2017-07 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/119781498874101671/Land-productivity-and-plot-size-is-measurement-error-driving-the-inverse-relationship http://hdl.handle.net/10986/27638 English en_US Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8134 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Publications & Research Publications & Research :: Policy Research Working Paper Africa Ethiopia
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English en_US
topic	LAND USE AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY PLOT SIZE CROP YIELDS
spellingShingle	LAND USE AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY PLOT SIZE CROP YIELDS Desiere, Sam Jolliffe, Dean Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
geographic_facet	Africa Ethiopia
relation	Policy Research Working Paper;No. 8134
description	This paper revisits the decades-old puzzle of the inverse plot-size productivity relationship, which states that land productivity decreases as plot size increases. Existing empirical studies on the inverse plot-size productivity relationship define land productivity or yields as self-reported production divided by plot size. This paper considers an alternative approach to estimating yields based on crop cuts. The crop-cut method entails measuring and harvesting randomly selected subplots by trained technicians, and is recommended by the Food and Agriculture Organization for the accurate measurement of crop production. Using data representative of rural Ethiopia, the analysis indicates that the inverse relationship is strong when based on self-reported production, but disappears when based on crop-cut estimates. The inference from these findings is that the inverse relationship is an artifact of systematic overreporting of production by farmers on small plots, and underreporting on larger plots. The paper also discusses how rejecting the inverse plot-size productivity relationship has significant implications for the inverse farm-size productivity relationship.
format	Working Paper
author	Desiere, Sam Jolliffe, Dean
author_facet	Desiere, Sam Jolliffe, Dean
author_sort	Desiere, Sam
title	Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
title_short	Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
title_full	Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
title_fullStr	Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
title_full_unstemmed	Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?
title_sort	land productivity and plot size : is measurement error driving the inverse relationship?
publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate	2017
url	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/119781498874101671/Land-productivity-and-plot-size-is-measurement-error-driving-the-inverse-relationship http://hdl.handle.net/10986/27638
_version_	1764465614314799104

Land Productivity and Plot Size : Is Measurement Error Driving the Inverse Relationship?

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