Total factor productivity - a measure of efficiency bringing agricultural sustainability

Productivity growth in agriculture is essential for development. But an increased production and productivity have not helped mitigate rural poverty or increase the income levels of farmers. Economically, partial productivity (production per unit of area), does not truly reflect whether it is because of more use of inputs or improvement in the efficiency of their use. It assumes that the supply of inputs used in the given level of production changed in fixed proportion, which does not hold good especially in growing economies like India. Thus, partial productivity is an inadequate measure of sustainability because it ignores time, secondary products like straw, which should be included in a sustainability measurement. In the past, major sources of growth in agricultural production were area and yield. In the face of sustainability, economists started measuring growth in terms of TFP including improvement of technology/knowledge, infrastructural development, human capital improvement, research, extension and policy interventions. As TFP increases, cost of production decreases, prices decrease and stabilize. A fall in prices help the urban and rural poor to increase their purchasing power. Sound public policies inspired by the SDGs, enhanced by collective research in TFPs is an approach to construct sustainability and productivity indices.