africa

Africa at a Fork in the Road: Taking Off or Disappointment Once Again?
variety seeds as determining variables for cereal yields. (Coefficients on measures
of irrigation, years of schooling, land-labor ratios, and tractor-land ratios are found
generally not to be statistically significant in the same regression framework.) The
strong result for fertilizer aligns with the findings of Block (2013), as does the strong
coefficient on modern variety seeds. The seed variable is courtesy of Evenson and
Gollin (2003), who found that African adoption of improved seeds picked up over the
course of the 1980s; this trend might help to explain a key source of the subsequent
TFP growth trends identified by Block.
Table 26.3: Effects of Inputs on Cereal Yield, Selected Developing
Countries, 2000-10
At an intuitive level, the coefficients on key inputs reflect the biophysical fact that
modern variety seeds produce higher yields when they are accompanied by better
rains and increased fertilizer use. But the slow growth in African yields amidst
long-term TFP growth draws attention to the missing factor inputs that should also
be driving output.
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