Zvi Lerman - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Zvi Lerman
Land reform and farm restructuring have always been a major component of the transition from plan... more Land reform and farm restructuring have always been a major component of the transition from plan to market in all formerly socialist countries, and especially in the 12 former Soviet republics forming the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Ukraine, the second most populous country in CIS (after Russia) and the third largest by area (after Russia and Kazakhstan), began the process of agrarian reform in March 1991, six months before the declaration of independence from the Soviet Union. However, all through the 1990s international organizations berated Ukraine for its slow and insufficient reforms. Derogatory phrases like "one step forward, two steps back", "changing the sign on the door", "disappointing performance", "lack of vigorous progress" were universally (and justifiably) used to describe the Ukrainian reforms during the presidency of Leonid Kravchuk (1991-1994) and then (perhaps with less justification) under Leonid Kuchma (1994...
... 5.04 Aliza Fleischer and Yacov Tsur - The Amenity Value of Agricultural Landscape and Rural-U... more ... 5.04 Aliza Fleischer and Yacov Tsur - The Amenity Value of Agricultural Landscape and Rural-Urban Land Allocation. Page 14. ... 11.04 Zvi Lerman, Csaba Csaki & Gershon Feder – Evolving Farm Structures and Land Use Patterns in Former Socialist Countries. ...
* Zvi Lerman is Sir Henry d'Avigdor Goldsmid Professor of Agricultural Economics, Depart... more * Zvi Lerman is Sir Henry d'Avigdor Goldsmid Professor of Agricultural Economics, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel (lerman@ agri. huji. ac. il). David Sedik is Senior Agricultural Policy ...
Russia has experienced dramatic changes in land ownership and land tenure since the dissolution o... more Russia has experienced dramatic changes in land ownership and land tenure since the dissolution of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991: agricultural land has been largely privatized, individual landowners now have legal rights to most agricultural land in the country, and previous prohibitions on buying and selling of land have been removed by recent laws. The necessary preconditions for the development of agricultural land markets have been met and we are beginning to witness transactions that involve individual landowners, and not only the state. However, further development of the embryonic land market is severely circumscribed by the inadequacy of the administrative and technical infrastructure. In this paper we discuss the dynamically evolving legal framework for land reform, consider the impacts of land reform on privatization and ownership structure of agricultural land, and analyze the development of land market transactions. The analysis is based on official statistical sou...
A comparison of regional dairy cooperatives with investor owned dairy firms for the period 1976-1... more A comparison of regional dairy cooperatives with investor owned dairy firms for the period 1976-1987 produced empirical findings that are at variance with the hypotheses suggested by the theory of cooperatives. The cooperatives in the sample performed significantly better than the IOFs when compared by leverage, asset turnover, and coverage ratios, while the rate of return to equity was not found to be significantly different. Techniques are also proposed for valuing the nonmarket aspects of cooperatives that are not captured by financial ratio analysis.
The objective of this study is to support the farm privatization and restructuring process in CIS... more The objective of this study is to support the farm privatization and restructuring process in CIS by presenting a wide range of strategic and tactical options that could be applied to eliminate, or at least reduce, the main factors responsible for the destructive accumnulation of in large farm enterprises.
This study summarizes the first five years (1991-96) of agrarian reforms in Ukraine, presenting t... more This study summarizes the first five years (1991-96) of agrarian reforms in Ukraine, presenting the results of a farm-level survey conducted in 11 provinces between January and March 1996. The findings show that the growth of private farming has slowed down after a vigorous start and that the number of independent family farms appears to have stabilized at around 33,000. Distribution of land and asset shares has been completed in roughly half the farms surveyed. Ukrainian agriculture remains dominated by large collective structures, and the failure of large farms to adapt to new economic conditions has resulted in a distinct deterioration of their financial performance. The survey suggests that land reform in Ukraine is in danger of stagnation and that the government must create the necessary institutional and market conditions to invigorate reforms.
Executive Summary Land and farm reform in Ukraine began more than 15 years ago and has proved to ... more Executive Summary Land and farm reform in Ukraine began more than 15 years ago and has proved to be a lengthy and difficult process. The first round of farm reforms in 1992-93 initiated privatization of land through the distribution of paper shares to the rural ...
The paper presents a comparative analysis of the productivity of corporate and individual farms i... more The paper presents a comparative analysis of the productivity of corporate and individual farms in Ukraine based primarily on cross-section data from a farm survey conducted by FAO in 2005. We calculate partial land and labor productivity, total factor productivity, and technical efficiency scores (using Stochastic Frontier Analysis) for farms of different organizational forms. Our results demonstrate with considerable confidence that, contrary to established convictions among the Ukrainian decision makers, the large corporate farms are not more productive than the smaller family farms. This finding is not restricted to Ukraine, as a similar result has been obtained by in Moldova, Russia, and the U.S. Policies encouraging a shift from large corporate farms to smaller individual farms, rather than the reverse, can be expected to produce beneficial results for Ukrainian agriculture and the economy in general. The government of Ukraine should abandon its inherited preference for large-...
For decades, Russian agriculture had had little technological progress and virtually no foreign i... more For decades, Russian agriculture had had little technological progress and virtually no foreign investment, which resulted in a stable production possibilities frontier and made the sector ideally suited to production function analysis. The production function estimations reported in Chapters 10-13 add to a series of previous studies of the input/output relationship in Russian agriculture (e.g., Clayton, 1980, 1984; Gray, 1981; Johnson and Brooks, 1983), which generally followed the same methodology. In the late 1970s and the 1980s, however, the average response production functions gave way in the economics literature to more sophisticated production analysis techniques that measured not only productivity but technical efficiency as well (Aigner, et al., 1977; Bauer, 1990). Some of the major methodological advances in applying technical efficiency analysis to individual firms were made by a joint Russian-American team in Moscow in the early 1980s (Jondrow, et al., 1982; Danlin et a...
This article examines the decision of farmers to sell part of their farm output on the market, us... more This article examines the decision of farmers to sell part of their farm output on the market, using data from the Republic of Georgia. A two-level empirical model is used, in which endowments and resource allocation decisions determine farm output and non-farm income, and these in turn determine market participation. We found, as expected, that farm output affects market participation positively, while non-farm income affects it negatively. Landholdings have an indirect positive effect on market participation, through its positive effect on farm output. Education has a negative effect on market participation, mainly through its positive effect on non-farm income.
Land reform in Moldova, as in all former Soviet republics, involves the transfer of land from sta... more Land reform in Moldova, as in all former Soviet republics, involves the transfer of land from state to private ownership, followed by allocation of individual entitlements to land. Ideally, it also involves restructuring of the traditional large-scale enterprises into market-oriented farming units. The new farming units may represent a wide range of organizational forms, including various associative structures as well
In Poland and Russia, small-scale individual farms employ more labor per hectare of land than lar... more In Poland and Russia, small-scale individual farms employ more labor per hectare of land than large-scale corporate farms, without suffering from lower labor productivity. Individual farming is a labor sink for the rural population, and land policies promoting individualization of agriculture in transition countries can alleviate the social consequences of rural unemployment without sacrificing agricultural productivity.
Eurasian Geography and Economics
A team of economists surveys Slovakia's agriculture, which continues to exhibit mediocre perf... more A team of economists surveys Slovakia's agriculture, which continues to exhibit mediocre performance on the eve of that country's accession to the European Union. The paper, utilizing national statistics as well as financial data collected from 1,200 corporate and 850 individual farms, evaluates the country's current agricultural policies, which emphasize self-sufficiency and state intervention, reflecting a weak political commitment to market- based agriculture. Also discussed is the limited progress in land privatization and farm restructuring, the preservation of inefficient and unprofitable large farms, as well as related rural impediments such as inadequate transport infrastructure and a shortage of skilled labor. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: Q15, Q18, Q24. 6 figures, 2 tables, 17 references. his article presents an assessment of agricultural and rural development in the Slovak Republic on the eve of EU accession.2 It is based on a wide ra...
The study reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structures of the transition eco... more The study reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structures of the transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). It demonstrates how different policies with regard to private property rights in land, degrees of control of land rental and sale markets, and procedures for restructuring of former collective or state farms resulted in significantly different farm structures in CEE countries as compared to most of the CIS. In particular, more secure land rights, greater emphasis on individualization of land, and more liberal land market policies in CEE generated a farming sector with a relatively large share of family farms (which are not necessarily small) and viable corporate farms. On the other hand, limited tenure security, ineffective individualization of land rights, and restrictive land market policies in most CIS countries produced a farming structure dominated by large and generally non-viable jointly-owned farms that continue to function much like the old inefficient collectives. Family farms are slow to emerge in transition countries with inadequate land policies. The agricultural sector in countries dominated by inefficient farm organizations is characterized by low productivity and misallocation of resources.
The paper reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structure of transition countrie... more The paper reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structure of transition countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The discussion shows how different policies for land property rights, degrees of control of land rental and sale markets, and procedures for restructuring former collective or state farms resulted in significantly
Land reform and farm restructuring have always been a major component of the transition from plan... more Land reform and farm restructuring have always been a major component of the transition from plan to market in all formerly socialist countries, and especially in the 12 former Soviet republics forming the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Ukraine, the second most populous country in CIS (after Russia) and the third largest by area (after Russia and Kazakhstan), began the process of agrarian reform in March 1991, six months before the declaration of independence from the Soviet Union. However, all through the 1990s international organizations berated Ukraine for its slow and insufficient reforms. Derogatory phrases like "one step forward, two steps back", "changing the sign on the door", "disappointing performance", "lack of vigorous progress" were universally (and justifiably) used to describe the Ukrainian reforms during the presidency of Leonid Kravchuk (1991-1994) and then (perhaps with less justification) under Leonid Kuchma (1994...
... 5.04 Aliza Fleischer and Yacov Tsur - The Amenity Value of Agricultural Landscape and Rural-U... more ... 5.04 Aliza Fleischer and Yacov Tsur - The Amenity Value of Agricultural Landscape and Rural-Urban Land Allocation. Page 14. ... 11.04 Zvi Lerman, Csaba Csaki & Gershon Feder – Evolving Farm Structures and Land Use Patterns in Former Socialist Countries. ...
* Zvi Lerman is Sir Henry d'Avigdor Goldsmid Professor of Agricultural Economics, Depart... more * Zvi Lerman is Sir Henry d'Avigdor Goldsmid Professor of Agricultural Economics, Department of Agricultural Economics and Management, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel (lerman@ agri. huji. ac. il). David Sedik is Senior Agricultural Policy ...
Russia has experienced dramatic changes in land ownership and land tenure since the dissolution o... more Russia has experienced dramatic changes in land ownership and land tenure since the dissolution of the Soviet Union at the end of 1991: agricultural land has been largely privatized, individual landowners now have legal rights to most agricultural land in the country, and previous prohibitions on buying and selling of land have been removed by recent laws. The necessary preconditions for the development of agricultural land markets have been met and we are beginning to witness transactions that involve individual landowners, and not only the state. However, further development of the embryonic land market is severely circumscribed by the inadequacy of the administrative and technical infrastructure. In this paper we discuss the dynamically evolving legal framework for land reform, consider the impacts of land reform on privatization and ownership structure of agricultural land, and analyze the development of land market transactions. The analysis is based on official statistical sou...
A comparison of regional dairy cooperatives with investor owned dairy firms for the period 1976-1... more A comparison of regional dairy cooperatives with investor owned dairy firms for the period 1976-1987 produced empirical findings that are at variance with the hypotheses suggested by the theory of cooperatives. The cooperatives in the sample performed significantly better than the IOFs when compared by leverage, asset turnover, and coverage ratios, while the rate of return to equity was not found to be significantly different. Techniques are also proposed for valuing the nonmarket aspects of cooperatives that are not captured by financial ratio analysis.
The objective of this study is to support the farm privatization and restructuring process in CIS... more The objective of this study is to support the farm privatization and restructuring process in CIS by presenting a wide range of strategic and tactical options that could be applied to eliminate, or at least reduce, the main factors responsible for the destructive accumnulation of in large farm enterprises.
This study summarizes the first five years (1991-96) of agrarian reforms in Ukraine, presenting t... more This study summarizes the first five years (1991-96) of agrarian reforms in Ukraine, presenting the results of a farm-level survey conducted in 11 provinces between January and March 1996. The findings show that the growth of private farming has slowed down after a vigorous start and that the number of independent family farms appears to have stabilized at around 33,000. Distribution of land and asset shares has been completed in roughly half the farms surveyed. Ukrainian agriculture remains dominated by large collective structures, and the failure of large farms to adapt to new economic conditions has resulted in a distinct deterioration of their financial performance. The survey suggests that land reform in Ukraine is in danger of stagnation and that the government must create the necessary institutional and market conditions to invigorate reforms.
Executive Summary Land and farm reform in Ukraine began more than 15 years ago and has proved to ... more Executive Summary Land and farm reform in Ukraine began more than 15 years ago and has proved to be a lengthy and difficult process. The first round of farm reforms in 1992-93 initiated privatization of land through the distribution of paper shares to the rural ...
The paper presents a comparative analysis of the productivity of corporate and individual farms i... more The paper presents a comparative analysis of the productivity of corporate and individual farms in Ukraine based primarily on cross-section data from a farm survey conducted by FAO in 2005. We calculate partial land and labor productivity, total factor productivity, and technical efficiency scores (using Stochastic Frontier Analysis) for farms of different organizational forms. Our results demonstrate with considerable confidence that, contrary to established convictions among the Ukrainian decision makers, the large corporate farms are not more productive than the smaller family farms. This finding is not restricted to Ukraine, as a similar result has been obtained by in Moldova, Russia, and the U.S. Policies encouraging a shift from large corporate farms to smaller individual farms, rather than the reverse, can be expected to produce beneficial results for Ukrainian agriculture and the economy in general. The government of Ukraine should abandon its inherited preference for large-...
For decades, Russian agriculture had had little technological progress and virtually no foreign i... more For decades, Russian agriculture had had little technological progress and virtually no foreign investment, which resulted in a stable production possibilities frontier and made the sector ideally suited to production function analysis. The production function estimations reported in Chapters 10-13 add to a series of previous studies of the input/output relationship in Russian agriculture (e.g., Clayton, 1980, 1984; Gray, 1981; Johnson and Brooks, 1983), which generally followed the same methodology. In the late 1970s and the 1980s, however, the average response production functions gave way in the economics literature to more sophisticated production analysis techniques that measured not only productivity but technical efficiency as well (Aigner, et al., 1977; Bauer, 1990). Some of the major methodological advances in applying technical efficiency analysis to individual firms were made by a joint Russian-American team in Moscow in the early 1980s (Jondrow, et al., 1982; Danlin et a...
This article examines the decision of farmers to sell part of their farm output on the market, us... more This article examines the decision of farmers to sell part of their farm output on the market, using data from the Republic of Georgia. A two-level empirical model is used, in which endowments and resource allocation decisions determine farm output and non-farm income, and these in turn determine market participation. We found, as expected, that farm output affects market participation positively, while non-farm income affects it negatively. Landholdings have an indirect positive effect on market participation, through its positive effect on farm output. Education has a negative effect on market participation, mainly through its positive effect on non-farm income.
Land reform in Moldova, as in all former Soviet republics, involves the transfer of land from sta... more Land reform in Moldova, as in all former Soviet republics, involves the transfer of land from state to private ownership, followed by allocation of individual entitlements to land. Ideally, it also involves restructuring of the traditional large-scale enterprises into market-oriented farming units. The new farming units may represent a wide range of organizational forms, including various associative structures as well
In Poland and Russia, small-scale individual farms employ more labor per hectare of land than lar... more In Poland and Russia, small-scale individual farms employ more labor per hectare of land than large-scale corporate farms, without suffering from lower labor productivity. Individual farming is a labor sink for the rural population, and land policies promoting individualization of agriculture in transition countries can alleviate the social consequences of rural unemployment without sacrificing agricultural productivity.
Eurasian Geography and Economics
A team of economists surveys Slovakia's agriculture, which continues to exhibit mediocre perf... more A team of economists surveys Slovakia's agriculture, which continues to exhibit mediocre performance on the eve of that country's accession to the European Union. The paper, utilizing national statistics as well as financial data collected from 1,200 corporate and 850 individual farms, evaluates the country's current agricultural policies, which emphasize self-sufficiency and state intervention, reflecting a weak political commitment to market- based agriculture. Also discussed is the limited progress in land privatization and farm restructuring, the preservation of inefficient and unprofitable large farms, as well as related rural impediments such as inadequate transport infrastructure and a shortage of skilled labor. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: Q15, Q18, Q24. 6 figures, 2 tables, 17 references. his article presents an assessment of agricultural and rural development in the Slovak Republic on the eve of EU accession.2 It is based on a wide ra...
The study reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structures of the transition eco... more The study reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structures of the transition economies in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). It demonstrates how different policies with regard to private property rights in land, degrees of control of land rental and sale markets, and procedures for restructuring of former collective or state farms resulted in significantly different farm structures in CEE countries as compared to most of the CIS. In particular, more secure land rights, greater emphasis on individualization of land, and more liberal land market policies in CEE generated a farming sector with a relatively large share of family farms (which are not necessarily small) and viable corporate farms. On the other hand, limited tenure security, ineffective individualization of land rights, and restrictive land market policies in most CIS countries produced a farming structure dominated by large and generally non-viable jointly-owned farms that continue to function much like the old inefficient collectives. Family farms are slow to emerge in transition countries with inadequate land policies. The agricultural sector in countries dominated by inefficient farm organizations is characterized by low productivity and misallocation of resources.
The paper reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structure of transition countrie... more The paper reviews the role of land policies in the evolving farm structure of transition countries in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The discussion shows how different policies for land property rights, degrees of control of land rental and sale markets, and procedures for restructuring former collective or state farms resulted in significantly