Efficiency of Groundnuts/Maize Intercropped Farms in Zoetele, South Cameroon: A Data Envelopement Approach

This article aims at evaluating and analysing the production efficiency of farms (FF) in the locality of Zoetele, South Cameroon. From a sample of 62 FF, we first estimate a model of Data Envelopment Analysis with constant and variable returns to scale, then a censored TOBIT model enabling therefore to identify factors of efficiency. Two main outcomes result from this study. First of all, we can see that on average, the level of technical efficiency of FFs is 44.60% when returns to scale are constant, and 67.80% when return to scale are variable. This shows off possibilities of efficiency substantial gains. Secondly, the farm size and the production destination impact negatively on the technical efficiency. Finally, the adherence to a peasant organisation and age improve it. From those results, we estimate that if one wants to improve the efficiency of the FFs, it would be interesting that the FFs organise themselves into associations in order to benefit from experience sharing, and government and nongovernmental organisations (NGO).