Year Published
- 2008 (0)
- 2009 (0)
- 2010 (0)
- (-) Remove 2011 filter 2011
- 2012 (1) Apply 2012 filter
- 2013 (0)
- 2014 (0)
- 2015 (0)
- (-) Remove 2016 filter 2016
- 2017 (1) Apply 2017 filter
- 2018 (0)
- 2019 (1) Apply 2019 filter
- 2020 (0)
- 2021 (0)
Research Topics
Populations
- Countries/Governments (0)
- Rural Populations (0)
- Smallholder Farmers (1) Apply Smallholder Farmers filter
- Women (0)
Types of Research
- Data Analysis (2) Apply Data Analysis filter
- Literature Review (0)
- Portfolio Review (0)
- Research Brief (0)
Geography
- (-) Remove East Africa Region and Selected Countries filter East Africa Region and Selected Countries
- Global (0)
- (-) Remove South Asia Region and Selected Countries filter South Asia Region and Selected Countries
- Southern Africa Region and Selected Countries (0)
- Sub-Saharan Africa (1) Apply Sub-Saharan Africa filter
- West Africa Region and Selected Countries (0)
Dataset
- ASTI (0)
- (-) Remove FAOSTAT filter FAOSTAT
- (-) Remove Farmer First filter Farmer First
- LSMS & LSMS-ISA (6) Apply LSMS & LSMS-ISA filter
- (-) Remove Other Datasets filter Other Datasets
Current search
- (-) Remove East Africa Region and Selected Countries filter East Africa Region and Selected Countries
- (-) Remove Farmer First filter Farmer First
- (-) Remove 2016 filter 2016
- (-) Remove FAOSTAT filter FAOSTAT
- (-) Remove South Asia Region and Selected Countries filter South Asia Region and Selected Countries
- (-) Remove Other Datasets filter Other Datasets
- (-) Remove 2011 filter 2011
- (-) Remove Agricultural Productivity, Yield, & Constraints filter Agricultural Productivity, Yield, & Constraints
There is a wide gap between realized and potential yields for many crops in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Experts identify poor soil quality as a primary constraint to increased agricultural productivity. Therefore, increasing agricultural productivity by improving soil quality is seen as a viable strategy to enhance food security. Yet adoption rates of programs focused on improving soil quality have generally been lower than expected. We explore a seldom considered factor that may limit farmers’ demand for improved soil quality, namely, whether farmers’ self-assessments of their soil quality match soil scientists’ assessments. In this paper, using Tanzania National Panel Survey (TZNPS) data, part of the Living Standards Measurement Study – Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA), we compare farmers’ own assessments of soil quality with scientific measurements of soil quality from the Harmonized World Soil Database (HWSD). We find a considerable “mismatch” and most notably, that 11.5 percent of survey households that reported having “good” soil quality are measured by scientific standards to have severely constrained nutrient availability. Mismatches between scientific measurements and farmer assessments of soil quality may highlight a potential barrier for programs seeking to encourage farmers to adopt soil quality improvement activities.
This brief explores agricultural data for Tanzania from the LSMS-ISA and Farmer First household surveys. We first present the differences in the LSMS and Farmer First survey design and in basic descriptives from the two data sources. We then present the results of our initial LSMS data analysis using the 2008/2009 wave of the Tanzania National Panel Survey (TZNPS), focusing on the agricultural data, before presenting our analysis of farmer aspirations and of gender differences using the Farmer First data.