Cereal Commodity Trading in Ethiopian Local Marketplace: Examining Farmers’ Quantity Measurement Behaviors

Kidane Assefa Abebe, Deyi Zhou, Bekele Gebisa Etea, Fekadu Megersa Senbeta, Dereje Kebebew Debeli and Rajani Osti
Additional contact information
Kidane Assefa Abebe: College of Economics and Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, No. 1 Shizishan Street, Hongshan District, Wuhan 430070, China
Deyi Zhou: College of Economics and Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, No. 1 Shizishan Street, Hongshan District, Wuhan 430070, China
Bekele Gebisa Etea: College of Economics and Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, No. 1 Shizishan Street, Hongshan District, Wuhan 430070, China
Fekadu Megersa Senbeta: School of Economics, College of Resource and Environmental Economics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Luoyu Road 1037, Wuhan 430074, China
Dereje Kebebew Debeli: Key Laboratory of Textile Science and Technology, Ministry of Education, College of Textiles, Donghua University, Shanghai 201620, China
Rajani Osti: College of Economics and Management, Huazhong Agricultural University, No. 1 Shizishan Street, Hongshan District, Wuhan 430070, China

Agriculture, 2018, vol. 8, issue 12, 1-15

Abstract: Local marketplaces are remarkable organizations for agricultural product transactions in Ethiopia. However, little is known concerning measurement practices in these micro-trading zones. Thus, this study intended to examine the cereal commodity quantity measurement behaviors of farmers in the local marketplaces of Ethiopia. A survey was conducted in four districts marketplaces ( N = 382) of the Oromia Region. The χ 2 test was employed to evaluate the association between farmers’ perception of the accuracy of local units and measuring instruments related to immoral buyers’ behaviors. According to the findings, farmers’ cereals quantity measurement behaviors proved the presence of unreliability which created transaction, measurement, social capital, and two-hand palm cereals gift costs. The χ 2 test results indicated that farmers’ perceptions of the accuracy of local units and measuring tools related to buyers’ unethical behaviors had significant relationships with bowl, glass, sack, and can local units, except for weight balance in Dendi and Bako Tibe, and for cans in the Gimbichu area. This study demonstrates that standardization of tools and measurements, together with institutional support, would have a huge potential for economizing transaction costs and making equitable cereals exchanges and efficient markets.

Keywords: economic transaction; measurement behaviors; local marketplace; local units (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/8/12/188/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/8/12/188/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jagris:v:8:y:2018:i:12:p:188-:d:186934

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture is currently edited by Ms. Leda Xuan

More articles in Agriculture from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().