Browsing by Author "Tadesse Beyene"

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    The Impact of Agricultural Extension on Maize Production: A Case Study of Sasakawa Global-2000 Extension Project in Bako Area
    (A.A.U, 1998-06) Tadesse Beyene; Admassie Assefa
    The SG 2000 extension project has been disseminating improved maize technologies, among others, to achieve its objective of improving farm productivity and thereby increasing food grain production. However, the SG 2000 project may not be special to weakness and constraints that the previous extension approaches were faced with. Thus, this thesis has attempted to identify determinants of extension participation, and to evaluate the impact of the SG 2000 extension project on maize production by examining the level of awareness, adoption, and the increment in productivity and profitability attained using the improved maize production in the Bako area. The Probit model and the Two-Stage Switching Regression approach were employed in the analysis using data collected from 225 sample farm households. It has been found out that proximity to the main road, number of oxen owned, total farm size owned, education level of the household head and availability of credit for down payment significantly affected farms decision to participate in the SG 2000 extension activities significantly high number of both the extension participant and non- participant sample farmers have been aware of the improved maize technologies. However, while almost all the sample extension participating farmers adopted the improved maize technologies, only 10% of the sample non-extension participating farmers adopted. The analysis showed that using the improved maize technologies is much more productive as indicated by the higher elasticity coefficients and the marginal products of the inputs. The increment in productivity (gross benefit) resulted from the extension program has been estimated to be 37. 25 quintals of grain maize per hectare. Considering different scenarios of cost for the improved practices the net benefit for the SG ranges from 726.46 to 1267.48 Birr per hectare, and accordingly the MRR ranges from 36% to 213%. On the other hand, the net benefit for the NSG from the traditional practices is only 385.60 Birr per hectare. Nevertheless, many technical and policy problems have been identified affecting the sustainability of the adoption and the incremental productivity of the improved maize technologies. Therefore, the use of the improved maize technologies and the net benefit exhibited by the adopters may be for the short-run and lo may be limited to benefit only few farmers. Thus, the challenge remains with how to accelerate the adoption and maintain the productivity level of the improved maize technologies on a sustainable base. In this regard, subsidizing and facilitating credit services, output price support, encouraging intra-regional trade, improving input supply, promoting the development of infrastructure and encouraging further research to develop streams of improved seeds are suggested.
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    Measuring Total Factor Productivity and Competitiveness of Ethiopia: Textile and Garment Industry
    (A.A.U, 2008-07) Hussen Jemal; Tadesse Beyene
    This paper analysis the levels of total factor productivity and competitiveness of Ethiopian textile and garment industries in sight from medium and large scale firms over the period 2001-2005. In this regard, textile and garment sub-sector plays an important role in industrialization and economic development. Despite its importance for industrialization, the Ethiopian textile and garment sub-sector has not shown encouraging sign both in terms of productivity and competitiveness. Hence, the general objective of this study aimed at analyzing the level of total factor productivity and competitiveness of Ethiopian textile and garment sub-se::tor using secondary data from central statistical agency of Ethiopia which covers five years period. The study considered 17 textile and 8 garment sample firms. In the analysis, the study employed stochastic frontier production function model and unit cost ratio method. The study made use of a computer program frontier version 4.1c and stata version 9 as a tool for analysis. The results of the analysis revealed that the level of total factor productivity and competitiveness capacity of the sub-sector is not good. On average, technical progress, technical efficiency and Scale efficiency (economies of scale) declined by -34%, -25% and -1.3% per annum over the study period, respectively. The negative change of these efficiencies resulted in negative total factor productivity growth. SO, the contribution of total factor productivity to output growth is found -60.3% per annum. With regard to competitive capacity, all the four digit groups of manufacturing activities in the sub-sector prove to be uncompetitive even in the domestic market. From this analysis, therefore, it would be probably drain that the growth of the subsector is pulled back by total fac tor productivity gro11" 17 & failed to compete both in domestic and international market as a result of increasing trends in technical regress, technical and scale inefficiencies as we:! as cost ineffectiveness. This is, perhaps, a reflection of firm level weakness with mediocre product ct design, use of backward machineries, limited international exposure and passive inaction to competitive products. Thus, textile and garment firms ought to family work in addressing their weakness and adjust themselves with the challenges of the changing global environment. Government should also play its supportive role in terms of ensuring fairly competitive domestic market, providing market and technology intonation, supporting trainings and minimizing transaction costs related to the provision of its services.
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    Mining Vital Statistics Data: the Case of Butajira Rural Health Program
    (Addis Ababa University, 2011-06-01) Tadesse Beyene; Million Meshesha
    Data milling is a relatively new field whose major objective is to ex tract knowledge hidden in large amounts of data. Vital statistics data offer a fertile ground for data mining by providing valuable source of information regarding the health status of a population. one of the most important public health functions is monitoring of a pulsation’s health Swills. At all levels of the health deli very structure a well organized health information system is vital for identifying the health needs of populations and for planning. implementation and monitoring of health interventions. The aim of this study is to discover knowledge that can be used to gain insight in to various aspects of mortality in the selected rural area of the country. The study explores the death aspect of the vital statistics data in the Blaire Rural health Program- BRHP database at butajira, Ethiopia. A data mining tool called weak is used build predictive model of 95,220 cases over an eighteen-year r period. A historical cohort study analyst is of vital statistic is conducted. It follows a IDM process modeling. This study apply classification algorithm , such as to extract interesting knowledge from temporal data on BRI-I!> database. The results obtained in the study contain valuable new information. These results com-eyed some interesting findings. The class frication algorithm reveals that the res lust indicates for the BRHP-' dataset, over 90% accurate results are possible for developing class frication r les that call be used in prediction From this result the researcher concludes that the vital statistics data can help to predict using the application of data mining classification technique given the limitation of this study. III general. the result from this study is encouraging
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    The Preference for Micro Insurance Products by Households in the Informal Economy of Ghana."
    (A.A.U, 2008-06) Davidson Newlove; Tadesse Beyene
    Over the past few decades, governments and donor bodies became more focused in alleviating poverty through major policy reforms such as the structural adjustment programmeas well as the economic recovery programe. The world bank and the international monetary fund therefore initiated numerous poverty reduction strategy (PRS) programmes through many governments in developing countries. In recent times, the government of ghana has intensified its crusade on poverty alleviation by granting microcredits through various microfinance institutions in the country to many micro entrepreneurs operating in the informal economy. the main objectives of this study was therefore to investigate the main types of risks facing sampled households operating in the informal economy of ghana and identify various coping strategies used in managing their vulnerability to risk and an appraisal of the preference for micro insurance as the best alternative coping candidate. The study used data from the data base of enterprise life assurance company in Accra for its analysis. Descriptive statistics and probit regression procedures were used in this study. the study reveals that households faced a lot of risks among which the major ones are health, death and business risks. It was observed that vast majority of households essentially used informal insurance as risk management options. the regression results showed an inverse relationship between informal insurance and sampled households preference for microinsurance. This means that the more households are keen on using informal insurance the less their preference for micro insurance services. Additionally, the coefficients of health and property risks were positively related to sampled households preference for microinsurance, meaning that, given households frequent exposure to these risks, the need for microinsurance must increase. this study invokes a major challenge on the government of ghana to ensure a smooth delivery of the national health insurance scheme to households and advises the national insurance commission to encourage insurance companies to intensify their awareness programmes on the benefits of their various micro insurance products as the major way forward in risk management.
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    Remittances and Household Welfare: Longitudinal Evidence from Urban Ethiopia
    (A.A.U, 2008-07) Getachew Bizuayehu; Tadesse Beyene
    Two views are raised on the impact of remittances at the household level. The first view contends that remittances directly augment the income or recipient households and provide financial resources, increased household investments in education, entrepreneurship, and health . However, the second view states that remittances might have negative incentive effect which results in an increased in reservation wage and reduction in labor supply. The study examined the impact of remittances on household welfare, selectivity bias with regards to migration and remittances, and how households allocate the remittances they received from different sources. Using the Ethiopian Urban Socio Economic Survey, descriptive and econometric methodologies are adopted. The main findings include: the amount of receipt from domestic and international sources increased during the study period, remittances are primarily used for consumption followed by expenditure for schooling. It is found that there is no selectivity bias with regards to migration and recipient of remittances. The result also confirn1ed that the predicted per capita annual expenditure of remittance recipient households is higher than households that do not receive remittance in both the including remittances and no remittance scenarios. Finally, panel data model is estimated and the result materializes the welfare improving impact of remittances on the welfare of recipient households. Therefore, designing policies that increase the inflow and usage of remittances are vital. Policies include: improving the operation and service of financial institutions, providing incentives and training for remittance recipients will further increase the contribution of remittances to household 's welfare.