Field-level impacts of improved lentil varieties in Bangladesh

Abstract

In the 1980s, the expansion of irrigated Boro rice and growing susceptibility of traditional lentil varieties to diseases led to decline in dry-season lentil production in Bangladesh. The advent of improved lentil varieties in the mid-1990s solved the disease problem, but lentils remained at an economic disadvantage to the highly productive Boro rice, particularly on irrigated lands. Cultivation of lentils continued on non-irrigated lands and during the short window between rice crops on irrigated lands. Levels and determinants of adoption of these improved lentil varieties have been documented in the literature, but little is known about their field and household-level impacts. Applying an instrumental variables regression to data collected from a sample of 1,694 lentil fields and DNA fingerprinting for varietal identification, this study provides estimates of the field-level impacts of adoption of improved lentil varieties (ILVs) in Bangladesh [truncated abstract].