Estimating Regional-Level Input Demand for French Agriculture Using a Translog Production Function.

The purpose of this paper is to estimate a system of input demand responses for French agriculture, supposed to be in static equilibrium with respects to all inputs. A translog production function with regional dummies is specified. The adjusted model is well-behaved for a large region in the input space and, therefore, allows general conclusions. First, input separability is rejected. The technical separability of materials for all primary inputs is quite large. Moreover, there is a substitutability relationship (except for intensive livestock farming) between labor and capital, land and labor, but capital and land are complements. Copyright 1989 by Oxford University Press.