Suchergebnisse

The fundamental aspects (water control, high-yielding seed varieties and chemical fertilizer) relating to the technical reform of post-Mao agriculture are discussed in this contribution. Decline in state financial emhasis on water construction. Extremely rapid rate of growth of chemical fertilizer use during the post-Mao period. (DÜI-Sen)

The essential ingredients of land-augmenting technical change, required by most developing countries in Asia, have been delineated by Professor Ishikawa and traced during earlier periods for India, Japan, Taiwan and Mainland China. Among all the indicators associated with progress in agricultural development, only three are indispensable to rapid and prolonged growth in yields at the initial stage: improved water control; abundant supplies of fertilizers; and high-yielding seed varieties responsive to these inputs. While the introduction of one or more of these three normally provides some growth in average yields, there are much greater returns when all three are applied appropriately. These are the fundamental ingredients of the "green revolution," which has provided rapid growth in cereal yields throughout most of Asia and elsewhere in the developing world.

This book chronicles how since the Neolithic era of the Stone Age, agricultural tools evolved from pointed digging sticks to electron microscopes. Weeds evolved into wheat, carrots, and more as humans selected and designed foods. People farmed sustainably since the last Ice Age with fire and fish traps, and more recently, agriculture has evolved to produce more for a growing worldwide population. Learning about problems from the past and the future that agricultural technology is meant to solve will help readers understand how applying critical thinking can change the world

Most of the historians of medieval India have been interested in the political, administrative and economic aspect of the period, while some have exhibited fondness for religious and cultural history, albeit in a limited sense. Of late, new sectors of study have been explored: for example, the development of technology during the medieval period.

1. History of China's Agricultural Aid to Africa: Why and How -- 2. Agricultural Development through Science and Technology: The Extraterritorial Travel of Agricultural Technocratic Rationality -- 3. Closing-Gap Experience Sharing in Foreign Aid: A Learning Process Based on Construction and Embedding -- 4. Writing Prescriptions while Selling Medicine: Development of a Mechanism with Blurred Boundaries -- 5. Institutional Learning: Innovation in Mutual Adaptation -- 6. Inspiration and Aspiration: National Interest and Profit Motive -- 7. Representing the Country: Assistance Provider and Boundary Construction

This paper addresses an old and recurring theme in development economics: the slow adoption of new technologies by farmers in many developing countries. The paper explores a somewhat novel link to explain this puzzle -- the link between market access and the incentives to adopt a new technology when there are non-convexities. The paper develops a theoretical model to guide the empirical analysis, which uses spatially disaggregated agricultural production data from Spatial Production Allocation Model and Living Standards Measurement Study survey data for Nigeria. The model is used to estimate the impact of transport costs on crop production, the adoption of modern technologies, and the differential impact on returns of modern versus traditional farmers. To overcome the limitation of data availability on travel costs for much of Africa, road survey data are combined with geographic information road network data to generate the most thorough and accurate road network available. With these data and the Highway Development Management Model, minimum travel costs from each location to the market are computed. Consistent with the theory, analysis finds that transportation costs are critical in determining technology choices, with a greater responsiveness among farmers who adopt modern technologies, and at times a perverse (negative) response to lower transport costs among those who employ more traditional techniques. In sum, the paper presents compelling evidence that the constraints to the adoption of modern technologies and access to markets are interconnected, and so should be targeted jointly.

Based on the hypothesis that Egyptian farmers maximize economic profits, the multiproduct translog profit function is used to estimate input demand & output supply functions for corn, rice, & cotton crops grown in Egypt's Nile delta. Elasticity estimates indicate a generally high degree of price responsiveness. These estimates are used to evaluate Egyptian agricultural policies concerning labor, mechanization, & output prices. It is concluded that Egypt's agricultural policies of taxing output & subsidizing certain inputs have had a substantially negative impact on agricultural productivity. 6 Tables, 12 References. HA

Based on the hypothesis that Egyptian farmers maximise economic profits, the multiproduct translog profit function is used to estimated input demand and output supply functions for corn, rice and cotton corps grown in Egypt's Nile delta. It is shown that Egypt's agricultural policies of taxing output and subsidising certain inputs have had a substantial negative impact on agricultural productivity. (DÜI-Sen)

Improvements in agricultural productivity and reductions in marketing costs in Mozambique are analysed using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. The model incorporates detailed marketing margins and separates household demand for marketed and home-produced goods. Individual simulations of improved agricultural technology and lower marketing margins yield welfare gains across the economy. In addition, a combined scenario reveals significant synergy effects, as gains exceed the sum of gains from the individual scenarios. Relative welfare improvements are higher for poor rural households, while factor returns increase in roughly equal proportions, an attractive feature when assessing the political feasibility of policy initiatives." -- Authors' Astract ; ISI; IFPRI3 ; TMD ; PR

Improvements in agricultural productivity and reductions in marketing costs in Mozambique are analysed using a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model. The model incorporates detailed marketing margins and separates household demand for marketed and home-produced goods. Simulations improving agricultural technology and lowering marketing margins yield gains across the economy, but with differential impacts on factor returns. A combined scenario reveals significant synergy effects, as welfare gains exceed the sum of gains from the individual scenarios. Factor returns increase in roughly equal proportions, an attractive feature when assessing the political feasibility of policy initiatives. ; Non-PR ; IFPRI1 ; TMD