Does Irrigation enhance and food deficits discourage fertilizer adoption in a risky environment? Evidence from Tigray, Ethiopia

Abstract

The northern Ethiopian highland in general and the Tigray region in particular is a drought prone area 
where agricultural production risk is prevalent. Moisture stress is a limiting factor for improved 
agricultural input mainly fertilizer use. Lack of capital and consumption smoothing mechanisms limits 
households’ investment in production enhancing agricultural inputs, possibly leading into poverty trap. 
Using a Cragg (Double Hurdle) model, we analyzed how rainfall risks, access to irrigation and food 
deficits affect the probability that farm households’ use fertilizer and given that the probability is 
positive and significant, the amount (intensity) of fertilizer use. Accordingly, we found that households 
were more likely to use fertilizer and that they used significantly higher amounts of fertilizer on their 
irrigated plots than on rain-fed plots. Furthermore, households with access to irrigation were more 
likely to use fertilizer, but the intensity (amount) of fertilizer they used was not significantly different 
from those households without access to irrigation. In investigating the effect of rainfall risk on fertilizer 
use, we found that fertilizer use was significantly higher in areas with higher average rainfall and in 
areas with lower rainfall variability. In general, irrigation was found significantly important for fertilizer 
adoption mainly in areas with low rainfall and high rainfall variability. Finally, we investigate the effect of 
food deficit on fertilizer adoption and found that both food self-sufficient and food deficit households 
were less likely to use fertilizer as coping mechanism. However, among those who decided to adopt, the 
food deficit households used higher amount of fertilizer than the food self-sufficient.