Individuals’ aspirations and their consequences for future-oriented behavior have received increased attention in devel-opment economics literature in recent years. At this stage, however, each study relies on ad hoc empirical instruments to measure aspirations, thereby limiting...

Fatalism is considered pervasive, especially in many poor communities. In this paper, we explore whether fatalistic beliefs have implications for the attitudes and behavior of poor rural households toward investment in the future. To explore the idea of fatalism, we draw inspiration from...

This study analyzes the perceptions, impacts, and rewards of farmers who adopted row planting for the production of teff as a result of being exposed to a technology promotion campaign for row planting of teff in the Oromia region of Ethiopia.

Ethiopia’s crop agriculture is complex, involving substantial variation in crops grown across the country’s different regions and ecologies. Five major cereals (teff, wheat, maize, sorghum and barley) are the core of Ethiopia’s agriculture and food economy, accounting for...

Studying the sources of growth in agricultural production, examining the extent of inefficiency, and identifying the sources of such inefficiency, is an important step forward to improve the livelihood of subsistence farm households in developing countries. A stochastic frontier analysis is used...

On the back of both a global food crisis and various domestic factors, Ethiopia has experienced one of the world’s fastest rates of food inflation in recent years. Yet the lack of high frequency survey data means that very little is known about the welfare impacts of these price changes....

In Ethiopia, as in many other African countries, there is a pressing need to improve household food security. An emerging consensus suggests that this is most easily accomplished through two development strategies with two complementary dimensions: investments that facilitate income generation...

The most recent (2010–2011) drought in the arid and semiarid lowlands (ASAL) of the Horn of Africa has rendered over 13 million people in need of food, and caused a devastating famine in southern Somalia. The drought has also raised concerns that pastoralist livelihoods in this region are...

How households adjust their consumption in response to changes in prices and income is crucial determinant of the effects of various shocks to market prices and commodity supplies. These adjustments in demand are particularly significant in Ethiopia, where many households consume inadequate...