This article investigates gender
inequality in agricultural productivity,
highlights its key determinants, and
approximates the potential production,
consumption, and poverty gains from
reducing or closing the gender
productivity gap. The analysis is
performed on the basis of representative
household survey datasets recently
collected in Nigeria, Tanzania, and
Uganda. In these countries, agriculture
remains the mainstay of the economy
and understanding the extent and
sources of gender productivity gaps is
crucial for building policy interventions
and empowering women. Our
econometric approach consists initially
in estimating a model of agricultural
productivity to uncover the impact of
gender of the land manager. Then, mean
and quantile-based decomposition
approaches are applied to each country
separately to underscore the sources of
gender differences in agriculture. Using
the estimated productivity differentials,
we finally measure the potential benefits
that each country could obtain from
closing or gradually reducing these gaps.
The results reveal that female-managed
plots have clear endowment
disadvantages in farm size, use and
intensity of non-labor inputs. The
findings show that on average femalemanaged
agricultural lands are 18.6,
27.4, and 30.6% less productive than
their male counterparts in Nigeria,
Tanzania, and Uganda, respectively. The
decomposition of the sources of gender
productivity differences indicates that in
the three countries, endowment and
structural disadvantages of female
managers in land size, land quality, labor
inputs, and household characteristics are
the main drivers of gender gaps. Finally,
closing gender productivity differentials
is estimated to yield production gains of
2.8% in Nigeria, 8.1% in Tanzania, and
10.3% in Uganda; to raise monthly
consumption by 2.9%, 1.4%, and 10.7%
in Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda; and
to help around 1.2%, 4.9%, and 13%
households with female-managed lands
climb out of poverty in Nigeria,
Tanzania, and Uganda, respectively.