Determining the efficiency of rice production in the Kadawa rice cluster of Kano State, Nigeria

In an efforts to increase the production of rice for food security and reduced deflation of foreign reserves, the Nigerian government eases access to fertilizer, extension services and improved rice seed. Therefore, the paper examines the effect of access to fertilizer and extension services infrastructures and improved rice seed on the productivity of rice farmers as well as identify their level productivity in the Kadawa rice cluster. A five Likert structured questionnaire randomly administered to a sample of 80 rice farmers in the 2018 crop season. The Cobb-Douglas stochastic frontier production model was used to analyze the data. The descriptive result shows that males (83.3%) dominated rice farming. The economically active age group are 53%, the married group are 65.2%, those with at least six years of experience in rice farming are 74.2%, and 22.7% attained tertiary education. Further, the stochastic frontier result shows that improve rice seed and extension services positively affect rice production, while fertilizer negatively affects rice production. Further, the result shows that years of experience in rice farming reduces technical inefficiency. While qualification, age, and marital status reduce rice production. Therefore, the study recommends the provision of educational facilities for quality education. Expanding extension workers’ services to farmers, since one visit per crop season seems to be not enough to offer the necessary information to farmers. Finally, to attract experienced, educated young married farmers to partake in rice cultivation in the study area.