Determinants of technical efficiency among lowland rice farmers in Enugu State, Nigeria: a stochastic frontier production function approach

The study examined the determinants of technical efficiency among lowland rice farmers in Enugu State, Nigeria. Primary data were sourced from producers through use well designed questionnaires. was conducted four agricultural zones during 2017/2018 cropping season. Multistage and simple random sampling technique employed to select 300 sampled for study. Cobb-Douglas stochastic production frontier function used analysis.The result revealed that (98%)of variation output because their inefficiency productive inputs area. .Apart farm size with estimated coefficient (0.0531), fertilizer (0.0329), seed (0.2319), labour (0.0804) agro-chemical (0.1711) underutilized by farmers. average 0.71 implying that, on average, respondents are able obtain 71% potential a given mixture inputs. Thus, short run, there is minimal scope (29%) increasing efficiency, adopting technology techniques most technically efficient farmer. High cost (MS=3.69), bad roads (MS=3.67), poor credit accessibility (MS=3.40) inadequate storage facilities (MS꞊2.90) found be major constraints recommends order improve resource area, more labour, seed, agro-chemicals should utilized.