Who Benefits More From Nerica Varieties? Gender Differential Impact on Yield and Income in Benin

The NERICA varieties are modern rice varieties developed by AfricaRice which won its creator Monty Jones the 2004 World Food Prize. They are widely believed to offer hope for Africa’s Green Revolution because of their ability to grow under multiple stresses as well as their high response rate to inorganic fertilizers and other inputs. This paper examines the gender differential impact of NERICA adoption on the yield and farmers’ household annual income using data from 342 rice farmers from Benin. It applies the potential outcomes framework to estimate the Local Average Treatment Effect (LATE) of NERICA adoption on farmers’ rice yield and households’ income. Evidence from the results shows that NERICA adoption has positive and significant impact on farmers’ yield and per capita annual households’ income. The impacts of NERICA adoption are not homogeneous across farmer gender and geographical area. The impact on rice yield is higher for female farmers potential adopters while the impact on per capita annual household income is higher for male farmers potential adopters. Concerning the geographical area, the impact on rice yield is higher for potential adopters from Central Benin while the impact on per capita annual household income is higher for potential adopters from Northern Benin. The findings suggest to impact assessment specialists to estimate not only the impact of technologies for the whole target population, but also for the different social groups inside the population. This will allow them to better understand the benefit of the technology to each group