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Dr. Habtamu Alem
Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy (NIBIO)

Basic Info

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Research Keywords & Expertise

0 climat change
0 farm business management
0 Agricultur economics
0 Food security
0 Performance-analysis

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Short Biography

Habtamu Alem has BSc. and MSc. degrees in agricultural economics from Haramaya University, Ethiopia. He also holds MSc. degree and a Ph.D. in environment and resource economics from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU). He is a research scientist in the Department of Economics and Society at the Norwegian Institute of Bioeconomy Research (NIBIO). Alem has good knowledge of environment and resource economics, which is the basis for circular economics. He is currently coordinating the SYSTEMIC project, in which the main task is to establish circular economies in eight E.U. countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Latvia, Norway, Portugal, and Spain). He plays a key role in the OECD network for farm-level analysis. orcid.org/0000-0002-9722-5374

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Journal article
Published: 08 February 2021 in Sustainability
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Growing environmental concerns have prompted governments to make sustainable choices in agricultural resource use. Evaluating the sustainability of agricultural systems is a key issue for the implementation of policies and practices aimed at revealing sustainability. This study aimed to evaluate the performance of Norwegian dairy farms, accounting for marginal effects of environmental (exogenous) variables. We adopted the dynamic parametric approach within the input distance function framework to estimate the performance of Norwegian dairy farms, focusing on the technical efficiency and determinates. For comparison, we also estimated the static parametric model, which was used by previous studies. We used unbalanced farm-level panel data for the period 2000–2018. The result shows a mean technical efficiency score of 0.92 for the dynamic model and 0.87 for the static models. The empirical result shows that the previous studies that focused on the static model reported a biased result on the performance of dairy farms. The dynamic efficiency score suggests that Norwegian dairy farms can reduce the input requirement of producing the average output by 8% if the operation becomes technically efficient. The environmental variables have a different effect on the performance of the farmers; thus, policymakers need to place special focus on these variables for the sustainable development of the dairy sector.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem. The Role of Technical Efficiency Achieving Sustainable Development: A Dynamic Analysis of Norwegian Dairy Farms. Sustainability 2021, 13, 1841 .

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem. The Role of Technical Efficiency Achieving Sustainable Development: A Dynamic Analysis of Norwegian Dairy Farms. Sustainability. 2021; 13 (4):1841.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem. 2021. "The Role of Technical Efficiency Achieving Sustainable Development: A Dynamic Analysis of Norwegian Dairy Farms." Sustainability 13, no. 4: 1841.

Journal article
Published: 01 February 2021 in Economies
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Previous application of the stochastic frontier model and subsequent measurement of the performance of the crop sector can be criticized for the estimated production function relying on the assumption that the underlying technology is the same for different agricultural systems. This paper contributes to estimating regional efficiency and the technological gap in Norwegian grain farms using the stochastic metafrontier approach. For this study, we classified the country into regions with district level of development and, hence, production technologies. The dataset used is farm-level balanced panel data for 19 years (1996–2014) with 1463 observations from 196 family farms specialized in grain production. The study used the true random effect model and stochastic metafrontier analysis to estimate region level technical efficiency (TE) and technology gap ratio (TGR) in the two main grain-producing regions of Norway. The result of the analysis shows that farmers differ in performance and technology use. Consequently, the paper gives some regionally and farming system-based policy insights to increase grain production in the country to achieve self-sufficiency and small-scale farming in all regions.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem. A Metafrontier Analysis on the Performance of Grain-Producing Regions in Norway. Economies 2021, 9, 10 .

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem. A Metafrontier Analysis on the Performance of Grain-Producing Regions in Norway. Economies. 2021; 9 (1):10.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem. 2021. "A Metafrontier Analysis on the Performance of Grain-Producing Regions in Norway." Economies 9, no. 1: 10.

Journal article
Published: 07 August 2020 in Research in Economics
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From a theoretical perspective, it is well stated that the farm's decision on the use of inputs depends on the farmer's ability to make an efficient decision over time. The existing literature in performance analysis of the dairy farms based on static modeling and thus ignores the inter-temporal nature of production decisions. This paper aims to construct a dynamic stochastic production frontier incorporating the sluggish adjustment of inputs, to measure the performance of dairy farms in Norway. The empirical application focused on the farm-level analysis of the Norwegian dairy sector for 2000- 2018. The dynamic frontier estimated using the system Generalized Method of Moments estimator. The analysis shows that the static model in the previous studies underestimates the performance of the dairy farms.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem. Performance of the Norwegian dairy farms: A dynamic stochastic approach. Research in Economics 2020, 74, 263 -271.

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem. Performance of the Norwegian dairy farms: A dynamic stochastic approach. Research in Economics. 2020; 74 (3):263-271.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem. 2020. "Performance of the Norwegian dairy farms: A dynamic stochastic approach." Research in Economics 74, no. 3: 263-271.

Journal article
Published: 19 November 2018 in International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management
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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the economic performance of Norwegian crop farms using a stochastic frontier analysis. Design/methodology/approach The analysis was based on a translog cost function and unbalanced farm-level panel data for 1991–2013 from 455 Norwegian farms specialized in crop production in eastern and central regions of Norway. Findings The results of the analysis show that the mean efficiency was about 78–81 percent. Farm management practices and socioeconomic factors were shown to significantly affect the economic performance of Norwegian crop farms. Research limitations/implications Farmers are getting different types of support from the government and the study does not account for the different effects of different kinds of subsidy on cost efficiency. Different subsidies might have different effects on farm performance. To get more informative and useful results, it would be necessary to repeat the analysis with less aggregated data on subsidy payments. Practical implications One implication for farmers (and their advisers) is that many of them are less efficient than the estimated benchmark (best performing farms). Thus, those lagging behind the best performing farms need to look at the way they are operating and to seek out ways to save costs or increase crop production. Perhaps there are things for lagging farmers to learn from their more productive farming neighbors. For instance, those farmers not practicing crop rotation might be well advised to try that practice. Social implications For both taxpayers and consumers, one implication is that the contributions they pay that go to subsidize farmers appear to bring some benefits in terms of more efficient production that, in turn, increase the supply of some foods so possibly making food prices more affordable. Originality/value Unlike previous performance studies in the literature, the authors estimated farm-level economic performance accounting for the contribution of both an important farm management practice and selected socioeconomic factors. Good farm management practices, captured through crop rotation, land tenure, government support and off-farm activities were found to have made a positive and statistically significant contribution to reducing the cost of production on crop-producing farms in the Central and Eastern regions of Norway.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem; Gudbrand Lien; J. Brian Hardaker. Economic performance and efficiency determinants of crop-producing farms in Norway. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management 2018, 67, 1418 -1434.

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem, Gudbrand Lien, J. Brian Hardaker. Economic performance and efficiency determinants of crop-producing farms in Norway. International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management. 2018; 67 (9):1418-1434.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem; Gudbrand Lien; J. Brian Hardaker. 2018. "Economic performance and efficiency determinants of crop-producing farms in Norway." International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management 67, no. 9: 1418-1434.

Original articles
Published: 21 July 2018 in Applied Economics
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This paper compares technical efficiencies (TEs) and technological gap ratios (TGRs) for dairy farms in regions of Norway, accounting for differences in working environments. We used the state-of-the-art stochastic meta-frontier approach to estimate TEs and TGRs to account for regional heterogeneity, and the ‘true’ random-effect model to account for farm effects. The dataset used was farm-level balanced panel data for 24 years (1992–2014), with 5442 observations from 731 dairy farms. The results of the analysis provide empirical evidence of small regional differences in TEs, TGRs, and input use. Furthermore, the results may provide support for the more regionally specific agricultural policy, in terms of support schemes and structural regulations.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem; Gudbrand Lien; J. Brian Hardaker; Atle Guttormsen. Regional differences in technical efficiency and technological gap of Norwegian dairy farms: a stochastic meta-frontier model. Applied Economics 2018, 51, 409 -421.

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem, Gudbrand Lien, J. Brian Hardaker, Atle Guttormsen. Regional differences in technical efficiency and technological gap of Norwegian dairy farms: a stochastic meta-frontier model. Applied Economics. 2018; 51 (4):409-421.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem; Gudbrand Lien; J. Brian Hardaker; Atle Guttormsen. 2018. "Regional differences in technical efficiency and technological gap of Norwegian dairy farms: a stochastic meta-frontier model." Applied Economics 51, no. 4: 409-421.

Journal article
Published: 01 July 2018 in International Journal of Production Economics
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This paper addresses the endogeneity of inputs and output (which is mostly ignored in the stochastic frontier (SF) literature) in the SF panel data model under the behavioral assumption that firms maximize returns to the outlay. We consider a four component SF panel data model in which the four components are: firms’ latent heterogeneity, persistent inefficiency, transient inefficiency and random shocks. Second, we include determinants in transient inefficiency. Finally, to avoid the impact of distributional assumptions in estimating the technology parameters, we apply a multi-step estimation strategy to an unbalanced panel dataset from Norwegian crop-producing farms observed from 1993 to 2014. Distributional assumptions are made in second and third steps to predict both persistent and transient inefficiency, and their marginal effects.

ACS Style

Gudbrand Lien; Subal C. Kumbhakar; Habtamu Alem. Endogeneity, heterogeneity, and determinants of inefficiency in Norwegian crop-producing farms. International Journal of Production Economics 2018, 201, 53 -61.

AMA Style

Gudbrand Lien, Subal C. Kumbhakar, Habtamu Alem. Endogeneity, heterogeneity, and determinants of inefficiency in Norwegian crop-producing farms. International Journal of Production Economics. 2018; 201 ():53-61.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Gudbrand Lien; Subal C. Kumbhakar; Habtamu Alem. 2018. "Endogeneity, heterogeneity, and determinants of inefficiency in Norwegian crop-producing farms." International Journal of Production Economics 201, no. : 53-61.

Conference paper
Published: 03 February 2018 in Sustainable Transport Development, Innovation and Technology
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Previous studies estimating TFP and its components can be criticized for not considering unobserved heterogeneity in their model. Moreover, the studies focused on the technical evaluation of a sector. However, the technical evaluation alone reveals how well farmers use the physical production process. There is a need to closely examine the cost efficiency of the farmers. In this study, we used a cost function (dual) approach to facilitating the decomposition and estimation of TFP components. Using a translog stochastic cost function, we estimated the level and source of productivity and profitability change for crop producing family firms in Norway. We used the true random effect to account for farm heterogeneity. The analysis is based on 23 years unbalanced panel data (1991–2013) from 455 only crop-producing firms with a total of 3885 observations. The result indicates that average annual productivity growth rate in grain and forage production was – 0.11% per annum during the period 1991–2013. The profit change was −0.14% per annum.

ACS Style

Habtamu Alem. The Contribution of Productivity and Price Change to Farm-level Profitability: A Dual Approach Analysis of Crop Production in Norway. Sustainable Transport Development, Innovation and Technology 2018, 255 -273.

AMA Style

Habtamu Alem. The Contribution of Productivity and Price Change to Farm-level Profitability: A Dual Approach Analysis of Crop Production in Norway. Sustainable Transport Development, Innovation and Technology. 2018; ():255-273.

Chicago/Turabian Style

Habtamu Alem. 2018. "The Contribution of Productivity and Price Change to Farm-level Profitability: A Dual Approach Analysis of Crop Production in Norway." Sustainable Transport Development, Innovation and Technology , no. : 255-273.