# **Annex A: Sample description and representativeness**

To obtain information on changes in welfare, production, and productivity in the small and medium-scale farm sector between 2021 and 2022, a nationwide phone survey of such farms in areas controlled by Ukraine was implemented from October to December 2022, in cooperation with the Ministry of Agricultural Policy and Food (MAPF), the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, and the Kyiv School of Economics.<sup>13</sup> Although the original intent was to construct a sample frame using data from the State Statistics Service of Ukraine (SSSU), complemented by the company registry, these sources cover only registered legal entities whose registration details are often no longer current. To capture informal farms, which, based on expert estimates, cultivate 32% of Ukraine’s agricultural area (Nivievskyi et al. 2021), a decision was taken to use the State Agrarian Registry (SAR) as a sample frame instead.

The SAR is an electronic registry that was established in August 2022, with the objective of transferring support to small and medium-scale farmers in a transparent yet expeditious way. It allows farmers of any legal status (a registered legal entity, a family-owned business (FOP), or individuals) to sign up at the SAR website (https://www.dar.gov.ua/) using their electronic signature and providing a minimum of personal information. The system then gathers information on all the land parcels to which the farmer has registered rights from the registry of rights and the cadaster and adds information on the farm from other registries.<sup>14</sup> The MAPF or any authorized entity can use information in the SAR to target programs to support the agriculture sector and interact electronically with potential farmers. Farmers can carry out the required actions digitally rather than by filling paper forms, including uploading scanned documents and photos or providing authorization for providers of certain services to access specific types of personal information stored on the system. Use of the SAR to implement an EU-supported producer support grant (PSG) as well as other programs<sup>15</sup> facilitated rapid sign-up, especially by small and medium-scale farms, many of which had previously been in the informal sector.<sup>16</sup> As the survey was launched in the second half of October, we set October 15, 2022, as the cut-off date to construct the sample frame by dropping farms without any registered land or a valid phone number. Appendix table A6 compares the resulting sample frame with all the registered farms in the database (Form 29) maintained by the SSSU in 2020, the last year for which such data are available, by farm size category (<50, 50-120, 120-500, and >500 hectares (ha)).

Panel A in appendix table A6 compares the number of establishments, showing that our frame includes 75,571 farmers, more than double the 36,167 in the Form 29 survey as used by the SSSU. Of these, 21% are legal entities, 11% FOPs, and 68% individuals, with the latter concentrated in the farm size class of fewer than 50 ha, of which 82% are individuals and 9% each FOPs and legal entities. Legal entities dominate in the larger farm size classes, making up 58%, 76%, and 97% of those in the 50-120, 120-500, and >500 ha groups, respectively. The SAR has better coverage, in terms of the number of farms, compared to Form 29, for the below 120 ha group (with 3.8 and 1.1 times the number of farms in the <50 and 50-120 ha groups, respectively) but worse coverage for farms that are larger than 120 ha, with SAR containing only

> 13 The survey was implemented by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, with financial support from the European Commission.

> 14 For example, the SAR automatically gathers information on any outstanding debts to the state (which would legally disqualify them from receiving state support) and on farmers’ registered livestock from the animal registry. The government plans to add information from other registries, including the mortgage registry and the registry of court cases, in the near future.

> 15 The PSG that targeted farmers who cultivated fewer than 120 ha provided a cash grant equivalent to US$100 for each hectare of land cultivated during the 2022 agricultural season in non-conflict-affected areas. Information from the SAR was first used to establish whether the farmer was below the 120 ha threshold. After subtracting land parcels registered in the names of farmers located in conflict-affected areas, maps with registered parcel boundaries were used to cross-check cultivation status against a crop map elaborated based on remotely sensed imagery to compute the total grant amount. The €50 million available under the program was fully disbursed by November 2022 and an evaluation that aims to compare differences over time in parcels by successful as compared to unsuccessful PSG applicants is currently underway. Beyond this, several donors are using the system to implement programs such as for the provision of short-term grain storage and delivery of seeds, fertilizer, or critical capital equipment (generators).

> 16 The SAR simplifies program implementation by providing reliable and current information from official registries, simplifying program application by eliminating the need for repeated filling of paper forms, and leveling the playing field and increasing competition in factor markets by creating a base of potential clients to which service providers or banks can market their services.

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