Conventional wisdom holds that Sub-Saharan African
farmers use few modern inputs despite the fact that most
growth-inducing and poverty-reducing agricultural growth
in the region is expected to come largely from expanded
use of inputs that embody improved technologies, particularly
improved seed, fertilizers and other agro-chemicals,
machinery, and irrigation. Yet following several years of
high food prices, concerted policy efforts to intensify fertilizer
and hybrid seed use, and increased public and private
investment in agriculture, how low is modern input use
in Africa really? This paper revisits Africa’s agricultural
input landscape, exploiting the unique, recently collected,
nationally representative, agriculturally intensive, and
cross-country comparable Living Standard Measurement
Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture covering six
countries in the region (Ethiopia, Malawi, Niger, Nigeria,
Tanzania, and Uganda). The study uses data from more
than 22,000 households and 62,000 plots to investigate
a range of commonly held conceptions about modern
input use in Africa, distilling the most striking and important
findings into 10 key takeaway descriptive results.