Key Findings

1. Generally some positive progress is observed on the provision public agricultural services at midterm period of AGP II compared to the baseline situation. First, Percentage of Male and Female headed households who use public agricultural service increased by 54.4% and 19%, respectively. However, disaggregating the result by types of public agricultural service including provision of extension service through training and demonstration, farmers’ field day and advice, the story is different, and mixed results observed. Less than half of the beneficiaries reported that they are satisfied with the quality of the services, implying the need to improve quality of the services. Second, the change in adoption of improved technologies is moderate & differ by crop type and gender of household head. Third, the use of irrigation generally remained the same though there is variation between new & previous AGPII woredas.

2. We found strong evidence that agricultural productivity has significantly improved in AGP II areas at midterm period compared to the baseline situation. First, crop productivity, measured in yield index (qt/ha), is significantly higher by 37 percentage points in AGP II woredas at midterm compared to the baseline situation. Second, milk yield, honey yield and egg yield is significantly higher by 9 percentage points, 53 percentage points and 15 percentage points in AGP II woredas at midterm period compared to the baseline situation, respectively.

3. We found strong evidence that crop commercialization has significantly improved in AGP II woredas at its midterm period compared to the baseline situation. First, household commercialization index, measured as a ratio of gross value of all crop sales to all crop produced, is higher by 13 percentage points at the midterm compared to the baseline situation. Second, out of 14 AGP II crop commodities, proportion sold increased for 11 types of commodities at midterm compared to the baseline situation.