agricultural price instability a survey of competing explanations and remedies there are two explanations for agricultural price dynamics one follows cobweb logic and models fluctuations driven by expectation errors but emphasises that these expectations create complex dynamics and possibly chaos the other stems from the rational expectations tradition of dynamics driven by real shocks the empirical evidence tends to support the latter but is not conclusive the rational expectations model generates an optimal dynamic path from which no improvement can be expected from public intervention however if we take account of all the potential market failures in agricultural markets and especially in developing countries this conclusion might require some qualifications although an appropriate policy design for stability has still to be achieved this paper surveys the positive and normative literature on agricultural prices highlighting empirical evidence and identifying remaining unresolved issues

wheat storage and trade in an efficient global market domestic and international linkages in speculative stockholdings and trade of wheat are analyzed using a dynamic rational expectations model of the world wheat market dominated by the u s and the eu the results demonstrate the importance of endogenizing both storage and trade in studying commodity markets and suggest that past government stockholdings have not followed efficient market outcomes results indicate that elimination of the export enhancement program by the u s and of export restitution payments by the eu are unlikely to have a major impact on wheat exports from the two regions but will save millions of tax dollars in both regions

stealth seeds bioproperty biosafety biopolitics transgenic seeds in both india bt cotton and brazil glyphosate resistant soybeans spread widely and rapidly through farming communities outside the reach of biosafety or bioproperty institutions stealth transgenics are saved cross bred repackaged sold exchanged and planted in an anarchic agrarian capitalism that defies surveillance and control of firms and states the outcome is more pro poor than alternative modes of diffusion but undermines a growing consensus in the international development community on appropriate bio safety and intellectual property institutions for biotechnology second stealth procurement of biotechnology divides nominally pro poor political coalitions driven by a great ideational divide on uncertainties and risks of transgenics the ability of seeds to move underground through stealth strategies of farmers undermines widely assumed bio safety regime capability likewise property in biotechnology appears less monopolistic and powerful more relational and contingent stealth practices of farmers in pursuit of transgenics contrary to wishes of firms states and many ngos suggest a different model of the farmer than that often encountered in both developmentalist and anti gmo discourse more active creative and autonomous less hapless and supine resultant incapacity of social institutions to secure interests of firms and states in biotechnology renders more likely eventual development of controls from genetic engineering the terminator technology of political dramaturgy

liberalized trade and domestic price stability the case of rice and wheat in india abstract this paper analyzes the effects of liberalizing foodgrain trade on domestic price stability using a multi market equilibrium model in which the direction of trade is determined endogenously and world prices are sensitive to the amount traded by india simulation results demonstrate that contrary to popular belief freeing of trade by india leads to greater domestic price stability even though world prices are more volatile freeing of trade by india also leads to higher world price stability under liberalized trade variable levies subsidies are more effective in stabilizing domestic prices compared to buffer stocks it is therefore in india s interest to argue for non zero binding on import tariffs and export subsidies at the wto negotiations

state intervention for food price stabilisation in africa can it work abstract although its arguments may have more general applicability this paper discusses the desirability and options for the stabilisation of staple food prices principally in eastern and southern africa it addresses three broad questions i why is stabilisation of food grain prices desirable ii what is technically feasible and iii can the governance and trade issues thrown up by suggested mechanisms be solved it considers a number of options for price stabilisation assessing the strengths and weaknesses of each and suggesting situations in which each may be appropriate

forward exchange futures trading and spot price variability a general equilibrium approach we investigate the effect of opening a forward or futures market on spot price or real exchange rate variability in a two agent two good two state general equilibrium model we derive a linear approximation to the change in spot price variability which results from opening such a market this is shown to depend upon such familiar parameters as substitution elasticities marginal propensities to consume and degrees of risk aversion our analysis highlights the importance of the income transfers which occur as a result of capital gains and losses in the forward market we find that there is some presumption in favor of the view that opening a forward market reduces spot price variability the presumption is strengthened the less risk averse are agents the central issue addressed in this paper has long been a subject for debate both practical and academic it concerns the effect of forward and futures trading on the stability of spot prices in the markets for both foreign exchange and for commodities in the real world this issue is of obvious importance some active futures markets have been closed on the grounds of their alleged destabilizing effects on prices 2 thus it is no surprise that this topic has been the subject of extensive empirical research 3 recently moreover a number of theoretical studies on this topic have appeared see peck 1976 turnovsky 1979 1983 sarris 1980 kawai 1983a 1983b 1984 and turnovsky and campbell 1985 the existing studies without exception adopt a partial equilibrium approach as a general consequence of this therefore these studies ignore completely any income effects generated by the creation of forward and futures markets the present paper in contrast takes a general equilibrium approach in order to analyze the question in the context of markets where income effects can be expected to play a significant role we shall argue in section 2 that forward and futures transactions in foreign exchange and in agricultural output may be thought of as dealing in futures contracts for broad commodity aggregates income effects which appear in the spot markets for such aggregates affect futures transactions significantly in order to analyze such general equilibrium effects we develop a rational expectations model with futures and spot markets the effect of opening a forward or futures market is isolated by comparing equilibria in our futures spot market model when the futures market is open and when it is closed the difference

the empowerment route to well being an analysis of farmer field schools in east africa summary the study explores empowerment and well being related outcomes of farmer field schools ffs an extension approach that has gained popularity with agriculture development programs in many african countries this is done by examining the empirical relationships between ffs participation and increased well being as well as ffs participation and empowerment and finally between empowerment and enhanced well being data analysis from the two thousand household questionnaires show a relationship between these aspects despite contextual differences in the three countries studied it is thereby argued that there could be scope to talk about an empowerment route to well being the paper further suggests that the most significant impact of ffs could be viewed in terms of building the capacity of local people to make choices and make decisions that ultimately lead to increased uptake of agricultural innovations access to services and market access as well as collective action a major conclusion of the study is that agricultural development programs should focus more on processes of empowering farmers as opposed to technical solutions that characterize most programs in order to create an appropriate mix of technological and social advancement for a development process that is sustainable in nature

adoption of agricultural innovations in developing countries a survey this paper reviews various studies which have provided a description and possible explanation to patterns of innovation adoption in the agricultural sector the survey points out that the tendency of many studies to consider innovation adoption in dichotomous terms adoption nonadoption may not be appropriate in many cases where the actual decisions are defined over a more continuous range more attention needs to be given to the socio cultural and institutional environment in area studies so that their interrelation with economic factors affecting adoption can be inferred the presence of several interrelated innovations is another aspect that needs to be considered more carefully in future research since a number of simultaneous decisions may be involved furthermore the possibility of regular sequential patterns in adopting components of a new technological package should be specifically addressed in future studies finally the impact of differential adoption rates on land holding distribution merits attention in future research

risk futures pricing and the organization of production in commodity markets this paper examines equilibrium in a spot and futures market with both primary producers growers and intermediate producers processors for a commodity that is subject to output shocks processors tend to hedge long in contrast with hick s theory of futures hedging nevertheless if transaction costs are low the two stage production process brings about a downward futures price bias consistent with hick s pricing prediction but if costs of trading futures are high growers tend to be differentially driven from the futures market reversing the direction of the bias futures trading may also affect the organization of industry when demand is inelastic futures trading can serve as a substitute for vertical integration as a means of diversifying risk because the risk positions of growers are complementary with those of processors

determinants of hedging and risk premia in commodity futures markets this paper examines the determinants of commodity futures hedging and of risk premia arising from covariation of the futures price with stock market returns and with the reve nues of producers owing to supply shocks that stochastically redistribute real wealth surplus between producers and consumers and to limited participation in the futures market the total risk premium in the model is not proportional to the contract s covariance with aggregate consumption stock market variability interacts with the incentive to hedge causing the producer hedging component of the risk premium to increase de crease with income elasticity for a normal inferior good production costs that depend on output raise the premium we argue that output and demand shocks will typically be positively correlated raising the premium high supply elasticity reduces the absolute heding premium by reducing the variability of spot price and revenue

the social dynamics of labor shortage in south african small scale agriculture this article examines the relationship between unemployment family structure and labor allocation in rural south africa chronic joblessness has meant that many young unemployed adults remain in the parental home however their productive labor is often not utilized in family farming using detailed ethnographic data on intra household social relations i argue that the prohibitive cost of marriage and its consequent decline has led to the erosion of obligations formerly implied by the conjugal contract young unmarried adults often have limited responsibilities to provide labor or income to the parental home diminishing the overall viability of small scale farming

modern varieties productivity and sustainability recent experience and emerging challenges abstract the contribution of modern varieties of cereal crops to increased productivity in the postgreen revolution period is reviewed and the future role of hybrids and biotechnology discussed particular emphasis is given to the ways in which modern varieties may contribute to input efficiency and sustainability finally economic and institutional issues in restructuring plant breeding programs for the most efficient use of resources in both the public and private sectors and at the national and international levels are analyzed

new ways of looking at old issues inequality and growth abstract the paper uses new cross country data on income and asset land distribution to show that i there is a strong negative relationship between initial inequality in the asset distribution and long term growth ii inequality reduces income growth for the poor but not for the rich and iii available longitudinal data provide little support for the kuznets hypothesis policies that increase aggregate investment and facilitate acquisition of assets by the poor might thus be doubly beneficial for growth and poverty reduction

the scramble in africa reorienting rural livelihoods abstract structural adjustment and market liberalization policies of the past 15 years have accelerated deagrarianization in sub saharan africa peasant producers have veered away from production of traditional export crops and commercial staple foods in rural areas remote from roads and urban markets nonagricultural income diversification has been substituted in the search for much needed cash earnings citing recent village survey evidence this paper argues that the economic restructuring of african smallholders work lives has been accompanied by deep rooted social change divisions of labor and decision making power within peasant households have altered and wealth differentiation between households has deepened depeasantization of the countryside is currently taking place as rural household members of both genders scramble for viable livelihoods

what do we learn from the price of crude oil futures summary despite their widespread use as predictors of the spot price of oil oil futures prices tend to be less accurate in the mean squared prediction error sense than no change forecasts this result is driven by the variability of the futures price about the spot price as captured by the oil futures spread this variability can be explained by the marginal convenience yield of oil inventories using a two country multi period general equilibrium model of the spot and futures markets for crude oil we show that increased uncertainty about future oil supply shortfalls under plausible assumptions causes the spread to decline increased uncertainty also causes precautionary demand for oil to increase resulting in an immediate increase in the real spot price thus the negative of the oil futures spread may be viewed as an indicator of fluctuations in the price of crude oil driven by precautionary demand an empirical analysis of this indicator provides evidence of how shifts in the uncertainty about future oil supply shortfalls affect the real spot price of crude oil copyright 2010 john wiley sons ltd

price stabilization using buffer stocks abstract the price stabilization problem is stated and solved for a nonlinear cobweb model with government stocks it is shown that if the storage capacity for the commodity is sufficiently large then there exists a simple stabilization policy called the keep supply at equilibrium kse policy such that the equilibrium price is a global attractor for the corresponding closed loop system in addition it is shown that if the government approximates the equilibrium supply with the average supply stabilization is guaranteed we refer to this policy as keep supply at average ksa

industry equilibrium uncertainty and futures markets abstract this paper studies competitive long run industry equilibrium with uncertainty and futures trading we also provide a long run analysis of futures trading instead of the conventional short run analysis it is shown without using a general equilibrium model that given uncertain demand and risk aversion a bias backwardation or contango arises in long run industry equilibrium given risk neutrality such a bias however disappears we find that the occurrence of the bias depends not only on the existence of a risk premium but also on the length of the period considered each risk averse firm operates at a less efficient scale and moreover an expected spot price never accords with marginal cost when the expected spot price is less than marginal cost the risk averse firm can secure profit by selling futures contracts more than the amount of its output in the presence of production supply uncertainty a risk neutral firm operates with excess capacity under additive risk while the firm operates with proper capacity under multiplicative risk the key lies in whether its average cost curve is shifted by production risk

why new crop technology is not scale neutral a critique of the expectations for a crop based african green revolution poverty reduction during the asian green revolution has been attributed to the inherent scale neutrality of new crop varieties making them equally beneficial to small scale and large scale farmers the term scale neutral is now reappearing in debates on agricultural development in africa with claims that crop technology is inherently scale neutral and that african smallholders will significantly benefit from new crop varieties not specifically developed for their contexts using a social shaping of technology sst perspective and the concept of biological embeddedness this paper critically examines whether it is helpful to describe crop technology as scale neutral when drawing lessons from the asian green revolution about how new crop technology can be of benefit to african smallholders the paper describes how political commitment rather than inherently scale neutral crops was central for the outcome of the asian green revolution it also highlights that while the effects of crop biology are often disregarded in adoption studies biology significantly affected the ability of green revolution crop technology to benefit smallholders and continues to do so today using maize and gm crops as examples this paper suggests that gm crops in their current form have reinforced a technological trajectory established with hybrid technology and directed it away from smallholder practices and agroecologies consequently describing crop technology as inherently scale neutral is not helpful for understanding how crop technology works in africa today and prevents important lessons being learned from the asian green revolution

forward market and international trade many studies on hedging currency risk and international trade 6 14 18 17 have investigated the simultaneous hedging and production decisions with the nonstochastic home and foreign earnings assumption these studies derived a separation theorem which shows that the production decision made by a multinational firm for international trade is independent of the distribution of the exchange rate and dependent only on the forward price the separation theorem has two different implications first although the production decision is shown to depend on the forward price there is still a missing link connecting the trading activity in the forward markets with international trade second exchange rate uncertainty will not have an impact on the level on trade since the forward price can be used by multinational firms as a guide for the expected future spot rate the first implication seems to contradict results by britto 8 and telser 37 demonstrating that futures price has a real impact on resource allocation and production within an economy the second implication is inconsistent with a number of other empirical studies 2 11 12 22 29 that have shown exchange rate uncertainty has an adverse effect on trade and other studies 5 13 that have found exchange rate volatility to have a positive impact on trade although some studies 7 27 do recognize stochastic foreign income in the foreign hedging they ignore the two kinds of issues discussed above thus this paper attempts to investigate the simultaneous decisions for foreign exchange hedging and production under a stochastic assumption of foreign earnings a simple model is developed here to examine a the interaction of forward markets with international trade and b the impact of exchange risk on trade by endogenizing the forward price in a variety of scenarios this paper derives several interesting results under the stochastic foreign income scenario a new foreign exchange hedging rule which incorporates the covariability of foreign earnings and exchange risk is derived further we find that the separation theorem breaks down under such a situation interestingly we are able to show a positive linkage between trading activity in forward markets and export furthermore

food security and storage in the middle east and north africa in times of highly volatile commodity markets governments often try to protect their populations from rapidly rising food prices which can be particularly harsh for the poor a potential solution for food deficit countries is to hold strategic reserves which can be called on when international prices spike but how large should strategic stockpiles be this paper develops a dynamic storage model for wheat in the middle east and north africa mena region where imported wheat dominates the average diet the paper uses the model to analyze a strategy that sets aside wheat stockpiles which can be used when needed to keep domestic prices below a targeted price this paper shows that if the target is set high and reserves are adequate the strategy can be effective and robust contrary to most interventions strategic storage policies are counter cyclical and when the importing region is sufficiently large a regional policy can smooth global prices this paper shows that this is the case for the mena region nevertheless the policy is more costly than the pro cyclical policy of a targeted intervention that directly offsets high prices with a subsidy similar to food stamps

the hedging of an uncertain future foreign currency cash flow this paper derives the optimal hedge of an uncertain unknown quantity future foreign currency cash flow this more general optimal hedge includes the traditional hedge for a certain known quantity future foreign currency cash flow as a special case the optimal hedge is found to be unbounded and determined by firm specific conditions including the variance of the expected cash flow and the correlation of that future cash flow with actual exchange rate movements simulated optimal hedge values are found for u s based multinational firms possessing s dm cash flows using exchange rate data for the 1981 1987 period special cases in which the optimal hedge ratio equals zero and one also are identified and we show that cash flow uncertainty can strongly affect the effectiveness of hedging

can position limits restrain rogue trading this paper studies the imposition of position limits on commodity futures from the perspective of curbing excessive speculation and thus manipulation we present a simple general equilibrium model in a static rational expectations framework and agent heterogeneity to illustrate that excessive speculation serves to enrich other agents at the expense of the speculator position limits on the contrary are not only superfluous but also counter productive as they exacerbate market power and lead to a deterioration in efficiency position limits not only reduce social welfare but also cannot restrain market manipulation

six characters and a few more in search of an author how to rescue rural development before it s too late rural development has not received the priority and attention warranted by the present and future concentration of poverty in rural areas is this perhaps because rural development agencies present conflicting narratives a framework is presented within which to answer that question and is then applied to the recent policy statements of the european union eu food and agriculture organization fao international fund for agricultural deveopment ifad and the world bank each policy statement is compelling in its own way but the strategies are not consistent a narrative is needed which recognizes the rapid pace of change in rural areas acknowledges the need for diversification out of agriculture builds market institutions for growth and works effectively within the current international consensus on poverty reduction emphasising opportunity empowerment and security

optimal food price stabilization in a small open developing country in poor countries most governments implement policies aiming to stabilize the prices of staple foods which often include storage and trade measures insulating their domestic market from the world market it is of crucial importance to understand the precise motivations and efficiency of those interventions because they can have consequences worldwide this paper addresses those issues by analyzing the case of a small open developing country confronted by shocks to both the crop yield and foreign price in this model government interventions may be justified by the lack of an insurance market for food prices considering this market imperfection the authors design optimal public interventions through trade and storage policies they show that an optimal trade policy largely consists of subsidizing imports and taxing exports which benefits consumers at the expense of producers import subsidies alleviate the non negativity of food storage in other words when stocks are exhausted subsidizing imports prevents domestic price spikes one striking result an optimal storage policy on its own is detrimental to consumers since its stabilizing benefits leak into the world market and it raises the average domestic price by contrast an optimal combination of storage and trade policies results in a powerful stabilizing effect for domestic food prices

land reform as commenced business the evidence against stopping abstract in the new paradigm institutions are long term endogenous thus the aims of land reform must be compatible with replace or substitute for initial incentives and power structures many reforms e g compulsory collectives are not redefinition of land reform is therefore needed yet the case for private land redistribution with ceilings remains the inverse relationship rests firmly on lower cost labor transactions in small farms though large but competitive transport or processing firms which enjoy lower cost capital transactions may be needed crucial is the impact of the postreform structure on livelihoods especially for the growing rural majority near landless workers new style market based reforms have potential probably best combined with old style ceilings substantial compensation with urban taxpayers sharing costs alternative off farm prospects and progressive taxes on large landholdings or bequests

domestic and international impacts of the rice trade policy reform in the philippines abstract faced with high domestic rice prices that have fueled inflation above the 2018 target and penalized poor consumers the most the government of the philippines has decided to abandon the quantitative restrictions on imports and replace them with tariffs this paper uses a global rice model based on a partial equilibrium framework to assess the possible impacts of this reform on imports production consumption and prices in contrast with past similar studies we address three key concerns i the heterogeneity in farm price across 16 regions in response to the combined effect of the tarriffication and the average historical trend in productivity increase at 1 5 between 2001 and 2018 ii the differentiation of imports by origin partly due to the different tariffs applied to countries within and beyond the association of south east asian nations and iii the effect on domestic prices in third countries the simulation results suggest that the reform would increase imports by 2 47 million tons 20 7 in 2019 we also find a large decline in farm prices and retail prices respectively by php 6 1 kg 30 1 and php 7 6 kg 17 4 in 2019 that explains an increase in rice consumption we estimate the fall in total inflation at 1 2 in 2019 but less over time further the large fall in farm prices in 2019 is shared quite evenly among regions in the short term but returns to pre reform levels in the near term using a higher price elasticity of supply for one region obtained from panel data surveys we show a more pronounced decline in production than the national average such differentiated results confirm the relevance of using a regionally disaggregated model to design more targeted policies we also show a slight increase in world prices which led to small increases in the domestic prices of south and southeast asian rice markets while this reform is largely pro poor consumers policy makers would need to use the additional tariff revenue to help rice growers either increase their competitiveness and modernize their rice production or shift to other crops

seasonal patterns of futures hedging and the resolution of output uncertainty abstract optimal futures hedging is examined in a two good model with stochastic output and sequential information arrival a producer s optimal hedge depends on demand elasticity sensitivity of his output to weather his correlation with aggregate output and how rapidly his output uncertainty is resolved relative to other producers during different seasonal periods because regional output uncertainties are resolved at different times the optimal futures position of a grower will commonly reverse in direction during the crop year a producer with non stochastic output who faces price risk arising from demand shocks may remain unhedged or even maintain a long position

a note on futures markets with small price and production risks when the spot price and production risk are jointly normally distributed the mean variance approach has little theoretical justification the authors use taylor approximations instead and show the three results one farmers hedge less than expected production when the futures price is less than or equal to the expected spot price two when the futures price equals the expected spot price farmers facing production risk produce less than those without production risk three normal backwardation contango prevails in the markets when correlation between the spot price and production risk is smaller greater in absolute value than the ratio of coefficients of variation of these variables copyright 1992 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

the future of small farms trajectories and policy priorities summary while smallholder development has in the past led to reductions in poverty and hunger does this still apply in today s more globalized world this paper reviews the debates on the contemporary role of agriculture in development and the case for small farms in light of the rise of supermarkets lower commodity prices and liberalized trade agricultural research funding environmental change hiv aids and changing policy ideas although the answers vary greatly by context for many low income countries smallholder development remains a key option the policy agenda however has changed in addition to providing public goods the growing challenge is to overcome market failures which is largely a matter of institutional innovation

trade liberalization and domestic price instability in an agricultural commodity market price instability appears to be a feature of many agricultural markets in turn reduction of instability is a key motive for intervention in industrialized countries where trade instruments are used for this purpose they can sever the link between domestic and international prices the consequences of market insulation for price variability are examined a simple partial equilibrium model is developed and its predictions are examined against the experience of liberalization in the british main crop potato market

the future of small farms summary interest in agriculture for growth and poverty reduction reawakened in the early 2000s made all the keener by the sudden rise in cereals prices on world markets in 2007 08 but is it still possible to drive agricultural growth through small farms as happened in the green revolution whether small farms have a future was debated at a workshop held in wye united kingdom in june 2005 it concluded that small farm development is not just desirable for poverty reduction but also feasible even in changing circumstances and particularly those of more concentrated supply chains with more demanding buyers that said while much that needs to be done is straightforward such as provision of public goods fostering the institutional innovations to allow small farmers to deal with the emerging supply chains will require patient work tailored to specific circumstances the future of all smallholders may well not lie in farming but the measures to stimulate the rural nonfarm economy and provide jobs for those leaving farming a favorable rural investment climate provision of public goods institutional development are largely the same as those for agricultural development as well

why has economic growth been more pro poor in some states of india than others abstract we use 20 household surveys for india s 15 major states spanning 1960 1994 to study how the sectoral composition of economic growth and initial conditions interact to influence how much growth reduced consumption poverty the elasticities of measured poverty to farm yields and development spending did not differ significantly across states but the elasticities of poverty to urban and rural non farm output varied appreciably and the differences were quantitatively important to the overall rate of poverty reduction states with higher elasticities did not experience higher rates of non farm growth the non farm growth process was more pro poor in states with initially higher literacy higher farm productivity higher rural living standards relative to urban areas lower landlessness and lower infant mortality

the simultaneous determination of spot and futures prices in a simple model with production risk this paper deals with properties of a rational expectations equilibrium when there is futures trading a simple two good model is analyzed where one of the goods is produced subject to production risk although the futures market provides insurance against price risk to producers it is income risk that concerns them whether they hedge in equilibrium is shown to depend on the price and income elasticity of demand for their output as well as on the degree to which consumers the other party in the futures transaction are risk averse

can gm technologies help the poor the impact of bt cotton in makhathini flats kwazulu natal abstract the results of a two year survey of smallholders in makhathini flats kwazulu natal show that farmers who adopted bt cotton in 1999 2000 benefited according to all the measures used higher yields and lower chemical costs outweighed higher seed costs giving higher gross margins these measures showed negative benefits in 1998 99 which conflicts with continued adoption but stochastic efficiency frontier estimation which takes account of the labor saved showed that adopters averaged 88 efficiency as compared with 66 for the nonadopters in 1999 2000 when late rains lowered yields the gap widened to 74 for adopters and 48 for nonadopters

plant breeding and poverty can transgenic seeds replicate the green revolution as a source of gains for the poor 1 abstract improved farm technology helps all main groups of the poor small farmers farmworkers other low wage labour when it raises labour value productivity but raises land and or water value productivity faster and cuts staples prices but raises smallholders total factor productivity faster from 1965 the green revolution walked these two tightropes largely by luck though targeting bigger piles of rice and wheat it cut poverty through consumption nutrition smallholder income employment risk reduction and ecological sustainability yet large areas were left out and from 1985 progress slowed in the new environment for research and agriculture how can transgenics revive and spread poverty reduction what has been the evidence so far what determines whether new varieties have traits conducive to poverty reduction who owns the research or what crop science is

can biotechnology reach the poor the adequacy of information and seed delivery abstract the paper examines the expectation that biotechnology can provide significant benefits for smallholder farmers it uses evidence from current seed systems and variety choice in developing countries in particular it examines the adequacy of information flow and the performance of seed markets many of the biotechnology innovations proposed for use by smallholders feature qualities that may not be immediately obvious to farmers implications are drawn for the potential demand for these transgenic varieties the adequacy of seed systems is also examined including the characteristics of local seed diffusion and the experience of commercial seed enterprises the paper concludes that investments in public biotechnology must be accompanied by policies that encourage commercial seed system development and that empower farmers to be able to take full advantage of new technology

african re agrarianization accumulation or pro poor agricultural growth recent signs of increasing agricultural production in a number of countries in sub saharan africa are by some commentators connected to local level differentiation this paper discusses such interpretations using household level longitudinal data from smallholder households in eight african countries for the period between 2002 and 2008 the use of a mixed methods social science approach complements traditional economic approaches through adding a spatial perspective pro poor agricultural growth so far is concentrated to particular villages where it is highly inclusive the policy challenge remains to devise strategies that can enhance growth also in marginal areas

behavioural and material determinants of production relations in agriculture in this essay we develop a framework for analysing the major institutions governing the production and exchange of output and the primary factors of production in rural areas the analysis incorporates general considerations of risk and information constraints jointly with the principal material attributes of agriculture and of agricultural production factors the framework is used to analyse barriers to the existence of the major intertemporal and factor markets it is applied specifically to land scarce environments for which it provides an internally consistent explanation for many of the well documented institutional features of such settings in addition the analysis provides new implications for among other phenomena the inter relationships among ownership holdings operational scale family size and factor productivity for the scarcity of animal rental markets and use of animals as collateral for the renting out of land by small landowners and for the existence of plantations for certain crops

testing assumptions underlying economic research on transgenic food crops for third world farmers evidence from cuba guatemala and mexico abstract transgenic crop varieties tgvs are being promoted as essential for improving small scale third world sstw agriculture most economic research on this topic makes critical untested assumptions including that farmers will choose tgvs over other varieties because tgvs are economically optimal and because farmers are risk neutral profit maximizers we tested these assumptions using data from a survey of 334 farmers in 6 communities in cuba guatemala and mexico in which farmers ranked 4 real and hypothetical maize varieties for eating and sowing our results did not support these assumptions most farmers preferred farmer varieties for sowing and especially for eating avoiding tgvs a preference associated with being risk averse and with non monetary preferences farmers more integrated into modern agriculture were more likely to choose tgvs these results suggest that farmers most in need of support and most important for conserving genetic diversity are least favorable toward tgvs and that alternative ways of improving sstw agriculture should receive more attention

the future of small farms new directions for services institutions and intermediation summary efficient pre and post harvest services are essential if small farms in high potential areas are to intensify production contribute to economic growth and reduce poverty they also matter if small farms in marginal areas are to manage their natural resource base in the face of growing population pressure and climate change difficulties that smallholders face in accessing services are reviewed showing how incentives for commercial delivery of services to smallholders differ between staple food traditional cash crop and high value product supply chains the major challenge in service delivery to smallholders in much of africa concerns coordination of service development and delivery different forms of intermediary institution for achieving such coordination are examined

the impacts of india s food security policies on south asian wheat and rice markets we quantify the extent to which india s success in stabilizing its wheat and rice markets affects other countries in south asia we deal with the variability of indian trade and price policies by a

changing locus of agricultural research will the poor benefit from biotechnology and privatization trends over the past decade the locus of agricultural research and development has shifted dramatically from the public to the private multinational sector three interrelated forces are transforming the system for supplying improved agricultural technologies to the world s farmers the first is the strengthened and evolving environment for protecting intellectual property in plant innovations the second is the rapid pace of discovery and growth in importance of molecular biology and genetic engineering finally agricultural input and output trade is becoming more open in nearly all countries these developments have created a powerful new set of incentives for private research investment altering the structure of the public private agricultural research endeavor particularly with respect to crop improvement

do futures benefit farmers simulations are used to analyze welfare and market and farm level effects of making futures available to producers of a storable commodity key features of the model are the explicit consideration of dynamic impacts due to inventories and of aggregate market effects associated with futures adoption by some producers application to the natural rubber market shows that futures availability can lead to sizeable market and farm level effects futures availability enhances consumer welfare reduces non adopter welfare and yields important welfare gains for adopters when their market share is small and welfare losses when they account for a sufficiently large market share

rural market imperfections and the farm size productivity relationship evidence from pakistan the subject of this article is the relationships between farm size and productivity and between farm size and profitability in the developing countries the recent controversies over the inverse size output relationship are reviewed and a framework is provided that explains the inverse relationship based on plausible assumptions about imperfections in the markets for labor land credit and risk from this framework a set of testable hypotheses are derived the hypotheses are tested on recent farm level panel data from pakistan a strong inverse relationship between farm size and yield is present in the sample even when household fixed effects are used to account for unobserved heterogeneity moreover the suggested market imperfections framework is consistent with the data