INSTITUTIONAL FACTORS INFLUENCING STRATEGIC CHOICE IN THE TEA SUB SECTOR IN KENYA
Abstract
Tea subsector in Kenya shows declining profitability due to rising cost of production that is largely wage bill driven. Firms have sought to mitigate this by adopting mechanical tea harvesting technology. The uptake of this technology is surprisingly varied. The study sought to establish the influence of institutional factors namely, firm size and managerial skills on adoption of the technology in Kenya’s tea subsector. The target population was therefore tea plantation firms. A descriptive explanatory survey design was used where both quantitative and qualitative data was collected by employing census technique due to small nature of the target population. Data analysis was done using descriptive and inferential statistics. F value of 72.023, significant at p<0.01 and R square of 0.83 was obtained indicating good fit and a high predictive model. Both firm size and managerial skills variables were significant at p<0.01 but had negative and positive effect on adoption respectively.
Key words: Mechanical tea harvesting technology, firm size, managerial skills, strategic choiceFull Text:
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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.61426/sjbcm.v1i2.55
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