An Economic Assessment of Banana Genetic Improvement and ...

80 CHAPTER 6
Table 6.2 Summary statistics for variables defined at the cultivar level
Mean (standard deviation)
Variable Definition Nakitembe Mbwazirume Kibuzi Nakinyika Enjagata Kisansa Mpologoma
Dependent variable
Count
Number of plants for
i = 1, . . . ,7 banana
cultivars
11.60
(6.95)
3.74
(2.29)
3.92
(1.74)
3.16
(1.77)
0.97
(0.68)
2.24
(4.60)
1.70
(4.56)
Explanatory variables
Farm-gate
price
Expected price received
at farm gate (thousand
Ush), by cultivar
2.05
(0.13)
2.10
(0.15)
1.88
(0.15)
1.69
(0.12)
1.81
(0.12)
2.15
(0.14)
3.03
(0.31)
Cooking
quality
Cooking quality (1 = bad;
2 = neither good nor
bad; 3 = very good)
2.92
(0.07)
2.91
(0.06)
2.89
(0.07)
2.97
(0.03)
2.93
(0.05)
2.88
(0.06)
2.82
(0.08)
Loss due
to black
Sigatoka
Expected bunch size loss
(percent) (in the case
of black Sigatoka)
6.05
(2.01)
4.14
(1.46)
7.90
(2.39)
6.68
(2.49)
1.63
(0.64)
3.53
(1.13)
3.56
(1.61)
Loss due to
weevils
Expected bunch size
loss (percent) (in the
case of weevils)
13.17
(2.87)
13.73
(2.76)
13.90
(2.68)
11.31
(2.56)
8.91
(1.55)
16.17
(3.31)
9.66
(2.27)
Notes: The mean is calculated as a weighted average for each variable. See footnote 9, Chapter 5, for explanation of measurement of yield
losses.
rience and education of the banana production
decisionmaker, 6 household size, the
proportion of dependents in each household,
the number of visits by extension
agents, livestock assets, and exogenous income
(defined as household receipts of remittances
and other nonfarm income in the
previous year). Larger households and those
with more dependents are expected to have
greater cultivar demand for meeting immediate
consumption needs. No sign is hypothesized
a priori for other household
characteristics.
Farm characteristics are banana production
area, household location (by elevation),
and the number of distinct cultivars available
in the village. Given the taxonomy used
to classify cultivars in the survey, the number
of distinct cultivars represents the local
stock of cultivar attributes. A positive relationship
between banana area and cultivar
demand is expected. No direction of effect
is hypothesized for the relationship between
a greater availability of different types of
banana planting material in a village and
the demand for any single cultivar. A greater
range of choice may lead to more or fewer
types grown per plantation.
Household transaction costs are represented
by a measure of the time needed to
get to the nearest banana market (Table 6.1)
and the supply (or farm-gate) price (Table
6.2). The farm-gate price is calculated using
a triangular distribution for bunch prices
6
Experience is corrected by age to reflect population dynamics in Uganda, where high mortality rates among
the active adult population cause young people to be relatively more experienced for a given task than would
otherwise be the case. The banana production decisionmaker is not necessarily the household head, but the
person in charge of banana production and management decisions in the household. In Uganda, this person is
often a woman.