EDUCATION AND TECHNICAL EFFICIENCY DURING THE GREEN-REVOLUTION IN PAKISTAN

Education affects productivity in two distinct ways, the allocative effect and the worker effect. The former centers on better allocation decisions, including adoption and diffusion of new technology, while the latter relates to a more efficient use of given inputs, that is, the technical efficiency aspect of production. There is some evidence that the worker effect of education is more likely to arise during disequilibrium caused by technical change. This article tests the hypothesis in Pakistan agriculture during the green revolution when introduction of new crop varieties disturbed the prevailing equilibrium. For this purpose a production function approach is used and the analysis is conducted not only for the new crop varieties but also for their traditional counterparts. The results lend support to the hypothesis by showing that the worker effect is stronger for new crop varieties than it is for traditional ones. -from Author