Suchergebnisse

Obwohl wertvollere Cash crops in vielen semiariden Gebieten Afrikas höhere Erträge als der Anbau von Nahrungsmitteln bringen würden, widmen sich iommer noch bis zu 90% der Kleinbauern in den meisten Trockengebieten Afrikas allein dem Anbau von Getreide. Grundsätzlich erscheint der Anbau von Cash crops tatsächlich viel profitabler. Im vorliegenden Beitrag wird jedoch argumentiert, daß der Anbau von Cash crops dennoch unökonomisch sein kann, und zwar dann, wenn die Vermarktungskosten von Nahrungsmitteln zur Versorgung der ländlichen Gebiete so hoch sind, daß sie diesen zunächst vorhandenen Preisvorteil überkompensieren. Diese Hypothese wird im vorliegenden Fall am Beispiel von Simbabwe überprüft. Ergebnis: Für einen Haushalt, der nicht gleichzeitig auch noch Selbstversorger mit Nahrungsmitteln ist, hätte der ausschließliche Anbau von Cash crops Nachteile. Mittelfristig jedoch könnten effizientere ländliche Nahrungsmittelmärkte zu dynamischen Veränderungen in der Anbaustruktur (in Richtung Cash crops) führen. (DÜI-Hlb)

AbstractLand markets are developing rapidly in Africa, though there remains a dearth of analysis regarding the direction and correlates of land prices and their implications for public policy in the region. This paper examines trends in land values and the factors influencing these trends in Tanzania. Real land prices rose significantly between 2009 and 2013 by 5.67% per year. A hedonic analysis of land values suggests that improved incentives for farming, urbanization and rising population density, and improved tenure security are possible drivers of rising land prices. We conclude by considering the potential policy implications arising from this work.

This synthesis revisits the "maize success story" in Sub-Saharan Africa, drawing selectively from an extensive published literature about maize seed technical change and related policies. The review focuses on the countries of Kenya, Zimbabwe, Zambia, and Malawi, where maize is most important in the food economy, and refers to the period when maize became a dominant food crop through the 1990s. The term "success" is equivocal in this case, both because of the difficult of establishing the appropriate counterfactual and because some of the policies that contributed to success in one period later led to decline. While the "seeds" themselves were the result of innovative, successful maize breeding, boom periods in maize production were episodic and the public investments in the controlled markets that bolstered them were not fiscally sustainable. Since maize will remain a crucial part of the food security equation even while the agricultural economies of the region diversify, continued investments in both maize research and market institutions, some of which must be public, are essential. The most vital question, however, is where the domestic political pressure to support these investments will originate -- an issue related to governance. ; Non-PR ; IFPRI1; Governance ; EPTD