Specialization, diversification, and productivity: a panel data analysis of rice farms in Korea
利用韩国水稻农场的面板数据，研究了生产活动专业化与多样化对生产率的影响，发现多样化带来微小但正向的生产率提升，主要源于产出间的互补效应。
Abstract This article examines the microeconomics of productivity associated with specialization/diversification in production activities, with an application to Korean rice farms. Korean rice farms tend to be very small and highly specialized. Our analysis examines the productivity effects associated with both farm size and farm specialization/diversification in Korean agriculture. Relying on farm‐level panel data, the analysis studies farm productivity in a multi‐input multi‐output context, accounting not only for changes in inputs and technical change in rice production, but also for the role of diversification in the production of other crops in current and previous periods. We find positive but small productivity gains from farm diversification. These gains come mostly from complementarity effects across farm outputs, with minimal effect of scale economies. The positive complementarity effects work against nonconvexity effects, which provide strong productivity incentives for rice farms to specialize.