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Impact Evaluation of Ama Krushi
INDIND -20 -1252Last modified on May 20th, 2025 at 10:26 pm
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Experiment rationale and/or abstract
We evaluate at scale the impact of a digital agricultural advisory service reaching
millions of smallholder farmers, in an eastern state of India. We randomized the
rollout of the service among 13,675 rice farmers within five districts, and measured the
impact on agricultural outcomes using both survey and remote sensing data. Using
survey data, we find that access to the digital service leads to significant improvements
in farmers’ knowledge and adoption of recommended practices, a modest increase in
rice yield and harvest, and a large reduction in the likelihood of rice crop loss on
average. Further analyses suggest that the treatment impact is concentrated in areas
hit by certain types of weather shocks, increasing harvest by up to 9% and reducing
severe crop loss by up to 21% in affected areas. We use vegetation indices (VIs) to
construct an objective yield measure for all farmers in the study sample and confirm
that our key survey results are robust against differential attrition, reporting biases,
and survey sample selection. While the VI-predicted yield provides valuable validation
of survey results, our analysis highlights the need for methodological improvements
in the effective application of remote sensing data to measure program impacts on
agricultural outcomes. -
Status
Completed & results available
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Start date
Q4 Oct 2020
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Experiment Location
India / Odisha, India
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Partner Organization
J-PAL , Government of Odisha
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Agricultural season
Kharif
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Experiment type
Impact Evaluation
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Sample frame / target population
Paddy farmers
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Sample size
13,675
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Outcome type
Knowledge, Farming practices, Profits, Harvest, Yields
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Method of Measurement
Remote sensing/GIS, Phone survey, In-person survey
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Research question(s)/hypotheses
1. What is the impact of a large-scale digital agricultural extension service on
rice farmers’ agricultural outcomes?
2. Examine the potential of using remote-sensing data to measure yields and
estimate treatment impacts. -
Research theme
IVR, Impact Evaluation, Measurement methods, Practice Adoption, Weather
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Results
- High levels of engagement with Ama Krushi were sustained over two seasons.
- Ama Krushi drives overall improvements in agricultural knowledge, adoption, yield (kg/ha), and harvest (kg).
- Ama Krushi showed encouraging signs of increased profits.
- Ama Krushi drives a large reduction in the likelihood of severe crop loss.
-The largest treatment impact was in areas affected by some (but not all) weather shocks.
- Ama Krushi has a long-run benefit-cost ratio of 12:1 to 19:1.
- Satellite data offer valuable insights, allowing us to validate our survey-based findings. However, there is a need for methodological improvements for effectively using remote sensing data to measure program impacts on agricultural outcomes.