Research & Development Expenditures and Climate Change Impact on Maize Productivity: A Case Study of Pakistan, China and India

Abstract

The current study is undertaken to empirically analyse the contribution of Research and Development expenditures on the productivity of maize crop in Pakistan, India and China. We employed an innovative panel data methodology PMG to estimate the impacts of R&D expenditures and other climatic variables on the productivity and yield level of maize crop in the mentioned countries. We found that R&D has significant contribution in increasing productivity in all these countries and the crop yield have been positively affected by R&D expenditures. However, the marginal contribution varies across different countries. Marginal contribution of R&D expenditure is high in Pakistan which sheds light on the importance of R&D on alleviating most of our agricultural issues. The climatic factors though have shown mixed effect but in case of Pakistan their negative effect is low as the threshold level of these factors for adverse effects are not crossed yet. Timely management and R&D on these issues can save agriculture from devastating effects of climate change factors. Research should focus on drought tolerant varieties with high potential. Social scientists should work on how to increase the adoption of new and innovative technologies for high yield agriculture. Communicating cost benefit studies to farmers can enhance their confidence of adopting the high-cost agricultural technologies.