This blog post presents the results from an assessment of farm commercialization in Myanmar after the dry season of 2022, based on data from a phone survey – the Myanmar Agriculture Performance Survey (MAPS) – that was conducted with more than 5,000 crop farmers in all states/regions of the country, over the period August 2022 – September 2022.
You can view the full publication here.
Key findings
- Security issues are getting worse for farmers. 27 percent of the farmers reported feeling ‘very insecure’ or ‘insecure’ during that period, an increase by 9 percentage points compared to the beginning of the year. 25 percent of the farmers reported that they could not move around without serious concern for security while 8 percent reported that some agricultural fields could not be cultivated because of conflict in their area.
- Agricultural inputs were mostly available during the dry season period. Chemical fertilizers were reported to not be available for 7 percent of farmers. However, it was difficult to access labor for 18 percent of the farmers. Conflict-affected areas suffered substantially more from labor availability problems.
- Input prices during the dry season increased compared to the same period last year by 55 percent for urea, 25 percent for mechanization, and 16 and 14 percent for hired labor of men and women, respectively.
- Farmgate prices are also on the rise compared to a year earlier. Paddy, green gram, and black gram (three important crops grown during the dry season) prices were 42, 29, and 39 percent higher, respectively, at the time of the survey than a year earlier. The highest price increases were noted for sesame and groundnuts, likely due to the lower availability and higher prices of imported palm oil, a substitute for these local vegetable oils.
- The majority of farmers reported higher crop sales income this year compared to the last. Small farms and farms in insecure areas however saw lower crop sales income increases.
Recommended actions
- The increasing insecurity in the country is hampering the functioning of the agricultural sector (leading to lower availability of agricultural inputs and lower incomes). An improved security situation is called for.
- Small farmers are relatively worse off compared to other farmers. They would benefit from support to their agricultural operations, potentially through agricultural cash programs.
