Title : The effect of sickness on family labor supply and crop productivity in Africa: Panel data evidence from Ethiopia
Abstract:
The success of a food system largely depends on the success of agricultural supply, which largely depends on productivity. Even though, African Agriculture is improving in terms of productivity per hectare, yet it remains low. Several factors are responsible for this. Among others, the use of input technology such as fertilizer, improved seeds, and agrochemicals is limited. Moreover, the rate of mechanization of African agriculture is extremely low. For example, a preliminary analysis of household survey data indicates that in Ethiopia famers used mechanization only on 5.3% of their plots, with a slight increase from 3.1% of usage before seven years. Lack of mechanization is not the only challenge. In addition to the limited mechanization, the family labor supply is affected by the sickness of family members. With the objective of looking into the effect of sickness on labor supply and crop productivity, the study applied descriptive and econometric analysis of panel data collected from Ethiopia in 2017 & 2024 with the interview of 8,951 households from 126 districts.
The descriptive analysis shows that:
- In line with the health theory, the sickness of household members is highest during weeding and harvesting. During these periods, the stress is higher, where their immunity could be too low to resist disease.
- The average number of sick male, female, and children during all farm activities is 2.48, 2.49, & 3.21 respectively in 2017, and this declined to 2.3, 2.1, & 2.0 again respectively in 2024.
- The average number of lost days due to sickness is higher in male than female members, i.e. during 2017, the average days of sickness in adult men, women, and children were 28.1, 25.1, and 14.7 days respectively per year.
- Sickness during farm activities of male and female sharply decreased over the seven year period to 15.5 and 16.0 days respectively, but that of children increased to 20.5 days per year.
- The decreasing average days of sickness in male members is due to decreasing sickness during harvesting, threshing, and transporting, but increased days of sickness before harvesting.
- The regional variations over time has similar pattern in male and female sick members, but the number of sick children increased in regions.
- The econometric estimation of the effect of sickness on crop productivity, measured by crop yield index aggregated by household, has significant negative effect on crop productivity, mainly in case of Male labor, but insignificant in the case of women labour. Following the existing findings, it is advisable to encourage the use of farm machinery and strengthen the health extension system to make working in the food system attractive, and curb the negative effect of sickness on crop productivity. Encouraging farm machinery use could not only enhance productivity and overcome supply-side constraint in African food system, but also decrease child labor and leverage children education.
Key words: Farm households, Family Labor, Health, Mechanization, Panel Data, Africa
