TY - JOUR

T1 - Farmers’ export market participation decisions in transition economies

T2 - a comparative study between Armenia and Uzbekistan

AU - Bobojonov, Ihtiyor

AU - Teuber, Ramona

AU - Hasanov, Shavkat

AU - Urutyan, Vardan

AU - Glauben, Thomas

PY - 2016

Y1 - 2016

N2 - The Russian import ban on Western food products has stimulated a discussion about whether and how countries in Central Asia and Caucasus might benefit from this political decision by expanding their agrifood exports to Russia. Given this background, our study compares farmers’ willingness to participate in export markets in Armenia and Uzbekistan. Discussions are based on the analysis of surveys of 400 farmers from each country conducted in the spring of 2015. The results show that farmers already participating in local markets have a higher motivation to engage in the production of exportable commodities when a sudden export opportunity emerges. Beyond this general finding, the relative importance of farm and infrastructure characteristics were identified under different commercialization levels. Although both types of factors have been identified as important determinants in the existing literature, our analysis provides further evidence. We demonstrate that variables related to farm characteristics play a rather crucial role in more subsistence-oriented small-scale farming systems as found in the case of Armenia. In contrast, infrastructure may become more important than farm endowments in more commercially oriented farming systems such as observed in Uzbekistan.

AB - The Russian import ban on Western food products has stimulated a discussion about whether and how countries in Central Asia and Caucasus might benefit from this political decision by expanding their agrifood exports to Russia. Given this background, our study compares farmers’ willingness to participate in export markets in Armenia and Uzbekistan. Discussions are based on the analysis of surveys of 400 farmers from each country conducted in the spring of 2015. The results show that farmers already participating in local markets have a higher motivation to engage in the production of exportable commodities when a sudden export opportunity emerges. Beyond this general finding, the relative importance of farm and infrastructure characteristics were identified under different commercialization levels. Although both types of factors have been identified as important determinants in the existing literature, our analysis provides further evidence. We demonstrate that variables related to farm characteristics play a rather crucial role in more subsistence-oriented small-scale farming systems as found in the case of Armenia. In contrast, infrastructure may become more important than farm endowments in more commercially oriented farming systems such as observed in Uzbekistan.

KW - Caucasus

KW - Central Asia

KW - Commercialization

KW - Cooperation

KW - Extension

KW - Subsidy

KW - Supply chains

U2 - 10.1080/21665095.2016.1262272

DO - 10.1080/21665095.2016.1262272

M3 - Journal article

AN - SCOPUS:85006379752

VL - 3

SP - 25

EP - 35

JO - Development Studies Research

JF - Development Studies Research

SN - 2166-5095

IS - 1

ER -