Does zero tillage save or increase production costs? Evidence from smallholders in Kyrgyzstan

ABSTRACT

Promoting zero tillage has been recognized as an important strategy for smallholders from an agronomic perspective. However, the economic effects of adopting zero tillage are still a matter of debate. Employing an endogenous switching regression model on the plot-level panel data of 878 Kyrgyzstan’s smallholders, we investigate the determinants of decision to adopt zero tillage and its effect on smallholders’ production costs. We find that the probability of zero tillage adoption is associated with employment in agriculture, assets, agricultural shocks, fertilizer use, number of plots and average distances from dwelling to household fields and to main road. Furthermore, the results indicate that zero tillage adoption decreases land preparation costs by 23%, but increases hired labour and herbicide costs by 13% and 15%, respectively compared to conventional tillage method. Nevertheless, zero tillage can reduce total production costs by 15%. Our findings suggest that zero tillage can be promoted as an option for resource-scarce smallholders, especially to those in remote areas with poor access to inputs and machinery services. Promoting zero tillage adoption as a labour-saving or herbicide reducing practice can create false expectations among smallholders.

KEYWORDS:

• Zero tillage
• resource saving
• production costs
• endogenous switching regression
• Central Asia

Acknowledgement

The authors gratefully acknowledge the funding made available by VolkswagenStiftung under the Doctoral Program for Sustainable Agricultural Development in Central Asia (SUSADICA, Grant Number 96264) within the funding initiative ‘‘Between Europe and the Orient – A Focus on Research and Higher Education in/on Central Asia and the Caucasus”. The first author thanks Zafar Kurbanov, Shavkat Hasanov, and researchers in the SUSADICA programme for their valuable comments on the earlier versions of the manuscript. The first author is thankful to Kadyrbek Sultakeev for supporting him during field trip to Kyrgyzstan. Finally, the authors are thankful to three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 https://www.no-tillfarmer.com/articles/10906-worldwide-no-till-acres-increase-93-in-10-years

2 According to the National Bank of Kyrgyzstan, an average exchange rate in 2016 was 1$ = 69.90 KGS and in 2019 1 US$ = 69.79 KGS.

3 Total livestock units (TLU) is calculated based on livestock unit (LU) coefficients according to the following sources: (1) https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Glossary:Livestock_unit_(LSU) and (2) http://adlib.everysite.co.uk/adlib/defra/content.aspx?id=000il3890w.198awldohj69f3#nix.