Demand for Maize Hybrids, Seed Subsidies, and Seed Decisionmakers in Zambia

Historically, this achievement was predicated on the commitment of the government to ensure food security through large fiscal outlays on parastatal grain and seed marketing, provision of services to maize growers, and a pan-territorial pricing scheme. The story of this achievement, which was most evident from 1970–89, has been summarized by Smale and Jayne (2010). Howard (1994) and Howard and Mungoma (1997) documented the period in detail. Contemporaneous, in-depth research in the Eastern Province of the country examined fertilizer use and gender aspects of hybrid seed use (Jha and Hojjati 1993; Kumar 1994). Maize became the dominant food crop in Zambia during the first half of the 20th century, yielding higher returns than the previous staple cereals, sorghum and millet. Easier to process and market, particularly as an export to the British starch market, maize was also an easy way to pay workers on the large-scale farms and mines of the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland (Smale and Jayne 2010). Following independence in 1964, the government invested in expanding state-directed marketing systems to support smallholder farmers and ensure a supply of inexpensive food for urban populations, tying grain marketing to the delivery of seeds, fertilizer, and credit on beneficial terms. As in other countries of Eastern and Southern Africa, maize became a cornerstone of the modern state (Jayne and Jones 1997). The successful development and diffusion of improved maize seed in Zambia during the 1970s–80s was a major achievement of African agriculture, but was predicated on a government commitment to parastatal grain and seed marketing, the provision of services to maize growers, and a pan-territorial pricing scheme that was fiscally unsustainable. Declining maize output when this system was dismantled contributed to the reinstatement in 2002 of subsidies for maize seed and fertilizer through the Fertilizer and Farmer Input Support Programs (FISP). In the meantime, seed liberalization has led to an array of new, improved maize varieties, most of which are hybrids. This analysis explores the determinants of demand for first-generation (F1) hybrid maize seed in Zambia based on a survey of maize growers during the 2010/11 cropping season. The survey was implemented by HarvestPlus, the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), and the University of Zambia, and collected data from over 1,128 maize growers representing the major maize-producing provinces in Zambia. The objective of the survey was to provide information that can be used by practitioners in designing strategies to promote vitamin A-enriched maize seed. The analysis identifies the factors that influence whether farmers grow maize hybrids and how much hybrid seed they grow, employing a control function approach to test and account for the endogeneity of the maize seed subsidy. The study also tests differences between male and female decisionmakers. To measure and test the importance of variety attributes and of various information sources in decisionmaking, the analysis applies principal components analysis and computes factor scores that are then used as explanatory variables. The results of the analysis show that hybrid seed use in Zambia is still very much an “affair of state” in that farmers’ use of first-generation (F1) hybrids is explained largely by inclusion in FISP. The quality (literacy) of the labor supply, the ratio of active labor to dependents in the household, sources of information, and length of residence in the village are predictors of maize seed subsidy receipt. Overall, the study finds that male and female seed decisionmakers may represent distinct demand segments. The fact that the percentage of seed decisionmakers who are women is much higher than the percentage of women who are de jure or de facto household heads has implications for the design of extension strategies and variety promotion. The study also examines the determinants of demand for first-generation (F1) hybrid maize seed in Zambia, and finds that the quality (literacy) of the labor supply, the ratio of active labor to dependents in the household, sources of information, and length of residence in the village are predictors of maize seed subsidy receipt. The study also finds that male and female seed decisionmakers may represent distinct demand segments, and that the percentage of seed decisionmakers who are women is much higher than the percentage of women who are de jure or de facto household heads. The findings of this study have implications for the design of extension strategies and variety promotion in Zambia. The study suggests that extension services should target farmers who are more likely to receive maize seed subsidies, and that variety promotion efforts should take into account the different information sources and decisionmaking processes of male and female seed decisionmakers. The study also highlights the importance of considering the role of women in maize seed decisionmaking, and the need for extension services to be more inclusive of women's perspectives and needs.