Determinants of Seed Cotton Output: Evidence from the Northern Region of Ghana

Abstract

This study looked at the factors influencing the output of seed cotton in the Northern region of Ghana. Basically, 200 cotton farmers were interviewed and multi-stage random sampling was used in the selection of cotton farmers. The analytical technique used in the study is the Augmented Cobb-Douglas production model. The results of the maximum likelihood estimation showed the significant determinants of seed cotton output at 10 percent to include: farmer’s educational status, experience, farm size, fertilizer, seed used, labour input, location, extension contact and farmer group size with the rest being not significant. The result of the estimation also shows decreasing returns to scale of 0.824. The relevance of these inputs underscore the call on policy and cotton companies to focus on not only the quantity of these inputs but also on their quality and timely provision.