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The purpose of this paper is to provide empirical evidence on the relationship between capital structure and technical efficiency (TE) for Italian cereal farms during the 2008–2014 period. Emphasis is given in the understanding of the relationship between the level of financial leverage for cereal farms and their production performance.

The methods employed in this research article are based on non-parametric techniques in order to derive TE estimates for a sample of Italian cereal farms based on available Farm Accountancy Data Network data to explore in depth the relationship amongst the financial exposure of the sector and the capacity to utilise an efficient and effective production technology. Furthermore, subsidies are considered in the model as a non-discretionary variable and therefore, as an input that farmers cannot directly influence within the production function. Hence, the non-discretionary Data Envelopment Analysis model is a more appropriate framework since it is not penalising farms at a lower level of Pillar I payments when benchmarked with farms that receive a higher level of payments.

The results show that significant improvements could be achieved for most of the farms in the sample by improving production and management practices. Furthermore, results provide an empirical support of the adjustment theory by showing a negative impact of debt to asset ratio to TE.

This research article provides a first insight on the evolution of the Italian cereal farms debt-TE relationship in periods where high price instability has been observed.

Rural farmers’ access to farm credit in Nigeria has been very low, which affects farm performance, and credit providers have blamed for the problem in the sector. While this general perception persists the fact may be the case of credit demand, rather than just the risk-averse attitudes of credit providers. The purpose of this paper is to investigate significant factors influencing farmers’ credit demand to ensure efficient credit provision.

The research adopted mixed methods for an in-depth investigation into the problem. There were 216 research participants split into equal halves of men and women from six local government areas of Nasarawa State. Data collection methods employed structured interviews, focus group discussions, close/open-ended and key informant interviews. Analytical tools involved descriptive statistics, the logit and multinomial logit models to determine participants’ socio-economic characteristics, sources of credit, access, factors influencing credit demand generally and from the various sources of credit identified.

Findings reveal only 47.6 per cent of the participants accessed credit, with fewer women accessing than men. The most accessed forms of credit are from the semi-formal sources, with more men accessing from formal sources and more women from non-formal sources. Factors having significant influence on credit demand generally are education, group membership and household size. And from formal, semi-formal and non-formal credit sources are education, information on sources of credit, deposits, household size and marital status; education, deposits, group membership, household size, flock size; and education, group membership, and gender from the non-formal credit providers, respectively.

Due to time constraint, this study data were collected concurrently with both quantitative and qualitative methods and did not allow for the interrogation of findings from one method with the other. In addition, the research categorised the agency of women based on marital status only as single or married and did not interrogate the agency of women further, this may be a limitation as some of the female participants are from polygamous homes.

Unlike the current concentration of Nigerian research of this kind with quantitative methods alone, this research contributes particularly to Nigerian research output and experience by triangulating both quantitative and qualitative methods to explore farmers sources of credit, access and factors determining access to credit in the study area.

Farm businesses in England are under pressure to intensify production sustainably while managing costs and meeting market demands. Commodity prices and support from Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) payments are important determinants of profitability. With the United Kingdom (UK) leaving the European Union (EU), revised policy will see farming more exposed to fluctuating commodity prices and financial support from Government more focused on encouraging environmental land management. The research reported here, investigated whether business management practices of farmers influences financial performance, and how policy could be tailored to better meet the needs of farm businesses.

Regression models were estimated for 862 Cereals, Dairy and Livestock farms in England using official data for 2011–2012, in order to assess whether different farm characteristics, business management practices (identified from a systematic review of 102 studies), knowledge acquisition indicators and manager experience had an effect on four different financial performance ratios. The financial performance of the top 25% of the sample was also compared to the bottom 25% in terms of use of business management practices.

The results show that business planning and benchmarking had a positive, statistically significant, effect on financial performance, as do business size and knowledge acquisition, albeit to a lesser extent.

The research reported here is the most extensive examination, to date, of the impact of management practices on the financial performance of farms. Thus, it sends strong policy recommendations.