Long-term and Spillover Effects of Rice Production Training in Uganda

http://www.grips.ac.jp/list/jp/facultyinfo/kijima-yoko/Using panel data from 2009, 2011, and 2015, this study estimates the impact of rice production training conducted in Uganda on the adoption of improved cultivation practices and productivities. Since the training program encouraged participants to share information with fellow farmers, we estimate the effects of the training on non-participants living in training villages (spillover effects). Due to the non-random assignment of project villages and training participation, a difference-in-differences model with household fixed effects was combined with inverse probability weighting approach to mitigate biases. Spillover effects to non-participants in training villages are indicated by increased total rice production by 0.4 tons and expanded cultivation area by 0.26 hectare. Although training increases adoption rates for better cultivation practice, namely, transplanting in rows among training participants, both in the short and long term, there were no measurable improvements in non-participants’ rice cultivation knowledge or in rice productivity.This paper is a result of a research project being conducted at Japan International Cooperation Agency – Ogata Sadako Research Institute for Peace and Development (JICA-Ogata-RI), entitled "An empirical analysis on expanding rice production in Sub Sahara Africa.