Impact Of Agricultural Market Reforms On Smallholder Farmers In ...

Respondents were asked whether the availability of pesticides had increased or decreased since
1992. Almost half the households had no opinion or said the question was not applicable because
they never used pesticides. The number of households reporting improved availability (21 percent)
was greater than the number reporting worse availability (15 percent), but the margin was not large.
The strongest indications of improvement were in Borgou and Zou, while farmers in Ouémé
reported a decline in availability (see Table 4.1.74).
Labor
The IFPRI-LARES Small Farmer Survey gathered information about the amount of labor
devoted to different activities in growing each crop. This information was recorded for four types
of labor: adult male family members, adult female family members, family members under 15 years
of age, and hired laborers. The results presented here refer only to crops grown in the main
agricultural season 10 . In calculating the number of person-days of work, we assumed that a day of
labor by a child is equivalent to 0.5 days of labor for an adult.
The results show that the total amount of labor allocated to main-season crop production is 565
person-days per farm or 170 person-days per hectare. The labor input per farm is quite different
across departments, but the labor input per hectare varies much less. The labor input is between
130 and 180 days/hectare in every department except Atacora, where it is 227 days/hectare. The
labor input per hectare is greatest in Atacora, the poorest department, while labor input is close to
the lowest in Atlantique, so the variation may be due to differences in the opportunity cost of family
labor (see Table 4.1.75).
Labor use by activity The main activities are weeding (33 percent of the total labor time),
land preparation (26 percent), and harvesting (23 percent). Differences in the allocation of labor to
different activities does not follow a clear pattern, but presumably responds to the production
characteristics of the main crops grown in each department (see Table 4.1.75).
The composition of labor use by activity is remarkably similar across expenditure categories and
for male- and female-headed households. The only difference is that male-headed households and
poor households appear to devote apply more labor per hectare in their crop production.
10
Although the questionnaire also collected information on cotton production in the second season,
this information was not incorporated because it complicated the interpretation of the results.
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