ANALYZING THE IMPACT OF FARMER FIELD SCHOOL ON TECHNICAL EFFICIENCY OF COTTON GROWERS IN SOUTHERN DISTRICTS OF PUNJAB-PAKISTAN: STOCHASTIC PRODUCTION FRONTIER APPROACH

This study was designed to assess the impact of Farmer Field Schools (FFS) on technical efficiency and to compare the cotton production of FFS and Non-FFS cotton growers in southern districts of Punjab Province, Pakistan. The four districts namely Khanewal, Bahawalpur, Rahim Yar Khan and Vehari were selected as a study universe. The multi-stage and equal allocation sampling technique was used to estimate the sample size. The data was collected in the year 2011 from 400 respondents, which includes 200 FFS Farmers and 200 Non FFS Farmers. The Stochastic Frontier Production approach of Cobb-Douglas type followed by Technical Efficiency estimates was employed to achieve the objectives of the study. The major findings of the study indicate that the farmers who were members of FFS have 38 percent more cotton yield compared to that of Non FFS Farmers. The analysis further reveals that cotton growers are confronted with diminishing returns to scale as the coefficient of chewing and sucking pest sprays are negative and statistically significant. The technical efficiency estimates illustrate that the mean technical efficiency score was 77.65 percent that implies that there is substantial room to enhance the technical efficiency by 22.34 percent of the cotton growers in the study area. The technical efficiency results also confirmed that no FFS farmer found in the lowest two ranges i.e. 36.83 to 46.83 percent and 46.84 to 56.84 percent. However, the lowest technical efficiency range of Non-FFS farmers was 36.83 to 46.83 percent, which implies that FFS Farmers are more technically efficient as compared to Non-FFS Farmers. The inefficiency model shows that increase in respondent’s age and high educational level have a positive contribution for cotton yield. Conversely, the contact of cotton growers with Agriculture Extension department contributes for high inefficiency shows the weak linkages between extension staff and the cotton growers of the study area. It is recommended that FFS approach should be a non-developmental programme and should be executed under the umbrella of single institution for its proper implementation and monitoring.