Determinants of supplementary feeding use among commercially oriented smallholder farmers in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa

Abstract

The importance of the adoption of agricultural technology in productivity and productivity gains can be realised when yield-enhancing technologies are used and disseminated. The main objective of this study is to identify the socio-economic determinants of supplementary feeding use (adoption of agricultural technology) among commercially orientated smallholders in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. The livestock sector is the largest contributor to the South African total agricultural output and consequently contributes greatly to the Gross Domestic Product. Communal farmers collectively keep the largest herd of livestock. Commercially oriented farmers in communal farming areas face the challenge of a shortage of grazing land. Many of these farmers share 13% of the South African agricultural land allocated to the former homelands, which are overstocked with the livestock population. As such, it has become necessary for communal farmers to use supplementary feeding for their livestock, especially in winter. However, it is not known how prevalent the use of supplementary feeding has become and what factors determine whether a farmer is likely to use it. Therefore, the first objective of this study is to describe the current state of supplementary feeding in the Eastern Cape. The second objective is to determine the proportion of smallholder farmers that have adopted supplementary feeding in the Eastern Cape. The third objective is to determine the factors that influence supplementary feeding use among commercially oriented smallholder farmers. The study used secondary data collected through questionnaire from three districts in the Eastern Cape: Amathole, Chris Hani, and OR Tambo. The Eastern Cape was chosen because it is one of South Africa’s major livestock-producing provinces. The study used secondary data collected from purposefully and randomly selected 379 commercial-oriented farmers collected from three districts “in the Eastern Cape: Amathole, Chris Hani, and OR Tambo”. The probit model was used to assess factors influencing supplementary use among commercially oriented smallholder farmers. Where the dependent variable was dichotomous, i.e. whether farmers use supplementary feeding or not (0;1), and when regressed with a set of independent variables such as farmer’s assets and socio-economic variables, four variables were found to significantly influence the decision to use supplementary feeding. The variable, the total number of household members, was significant at 10%. The total number of livestock was significant at 5%. The total farm income variable was significant at 1%. The variable market access was significant at 10%. The study concluded that less than half (46.70 percent) of surveyed farmers used supplementary feeding. The determinants of the use of supplementary feeding include commercially oriented farmers in the Eastern Cape who own livestock as well as sell livestock. The results suggest that owning livestock as well as selling livestock are the major determinants of supplementary feeding among commercially oriented farmers in the Eastern Cape. These results could aid the decision-making of policymakers regarding drought relief support for communal farmers and identifying farmers for relocation to commercial farms in the Animal and Veld Management Programme. While the study provides certain useful results that could facilitate policy for decision-making, it would be more useful if it would have been possible to give detailed results on how big a flock or herd should be in determining if a household would supplement the feeding of its animals. Future work should expand in this direction.

Keywords: smallholder farmers, supplementary feeding, livestock, probit model, Eastern Cape, commercially orientated.