The ‘high speed’ rotavator is used for shallow tillage to create a fine tilth and incorporate crop residues, often with a single tractor pass. Rotavator tillage has spread quickly in many parts of South Asia, despite short‐term experimental trials suggesting deteriorating soil quality and crop yield penalties. Evidence of rotavator impacts on farmer fields across soil gradients and time is largely absent. From a farm household survey conducted among wheat farmers in Nepal, we estimate wheat yield and profitability outcomes for rotavator adopters and non‐adopters using propensity score matching. We find that rotavator adoption leads to inferior outcomes, despite significant cost savings for land preparation (US$ 11–15 per hectare). With rotavator adoption, farmers lose about 284–309 kg of wheat grain and about US$ 93–101 of profits on average per hectare per season, and these penalties increase with longer‐term use of the technology. Adoption of rotavator appears to be driven by the cost and time savings for land preparation. Against this backdrop, new policy and extension efforts are required that discourage rotavator use and favour more sustainable tillage technologies.

中文翻译：

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表观收益，隐性成本：检查尼泊尔小麦系统中旋耕机耕作的采用驱动因素、产量和盈利结果。

“高速”旋耕机用于浅耕，以形成精细的耕作并合并农作物残留物，通常只需单次拖拉机通过即可。尽管短期实验表明土壤质量恶化和作物产量下降，但旋耕机耕作已在南亚许多地区迅速普及。旋耕机在不同土壤梯度和时间范围内对农田产生影响的证据基本上不存在。根据对尼泊尔小麦种植者进行的农户调查，我们使用倾向得分匹配估算了旋耕机采用者和非采用者的小麦产量和盈利能力结果。我们发现，尽管可以显着节省土地整备成本（每公顷 11-15 美元），但采用旋耕机却会导致较差的结果。采用旋耕机后，农民每季平均每公顷损失约 284-309 公斤小麦，损失约 93-101 美元的利润，而且随着该技术长期使用，这些损失会增加。旋耕机的采用似乎是由于节省了整地成本和时间。在此背景下，需要新的政策和推广工作来阻止旋耕机的使用并支持更可持续的耕作技术。