Creating New Opportunities for Rural Producers: Impact Evaluation of a Pilot Program in Colombia

Abstract

This paper presents the impact evaluation a program that targeted 57 small organizations of agricultural producers at risk of getting involved in illegal drug production in Colombia. It aimed at increasing their competitiveness by facilitating the commercialization of new licit alternative sources of income. We use panel data constructed from two annual censuses collected by the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime to evaluate the program. Specifically, we employ propensity score matching, regression discontinuity and Bayesian decision theory to assess the impact of the program. Our estimates suggest that the program was successful on increasing total sales, productive capacity area, and product's quality of the treated producers. Moreover, the program was more successful when combined with other programs that gave further incentives to abandon illegal drug production definitely.

Keywords: Drug Production, Productivity, Latin America

JEL Classification: O13, O33, O54, Q18