Multiple Leasing under Cropshare Tenancy — A Note

This paper attempts to explain the perplexing tendency to multiple leasing by both landlords and tenants in some countries. It shows that if the negotiation of share contracts involves significant transaction costs and there is some uncertainty regarding the output on tenanted plots, a risk-averse landlord maximizing expected utility will find it in his advantage to subdivide his land among several tenants and also permit his tenant to lease land from other landlords.     

Impact and implications of price policy and land degradation on agricultural growth in developing countries

In many developing countries, a high proportion of the population resides and works in rural areas. Agriculture is the dominant sector in rural areas and has the greatest concentration of poverty: landless workers, small tenant farmers, and small farm owners. Thus, any development strategy that is directed towards increasing employment and alleviating a country's hunger must concentrate on sustainable agricultural growth. Historically, economic development in most countries has been based on exploitation of natural resources, particularly land resources. Soil erosion and land degradation have been serious worldwide. Due to reasons such as high population pressure on land and limited fossil energy supplies, land degradation is generally more serious in the developing world. Empirical studies show that soil erosion and degradation of agricultural land not only decrease the land productivity but they can also result in major downstream or off-site damage which may be several times that of on-site damage. In promoting industrialization, governments of many developing countries adopt a package of price and other policies that reduce agricultural production incentives and encourage a flow of resources out of agriculture. Increasing evidence shows that these policies cause a substantial efficiency or social welfare loss, and a great loss in foreign exchange earnings. In addition, a World Bank study on the effect of price distortions on economic growth rates concluded that neither rich resource endowments, nor a high stage of economic development, nor privatization are able to make up the adverse effects caused by high price distortions. This analysis is primarily concerned with identifying the factors that determine the agricultural production growth rate and in testing the effects these factors have on agricultural growth in developing countries. Specifically, this study involves statistical estimation of an aggregate agricultural growth function based on cross-country data for 28 developing countries. Special attention is devoted to land degradation and agricultural pricing policy, and to the policy implications resulting from the effects these variables have on agricultural and food production growth. The overall results of this study show that price distortions in the economy and land degradation had statistically significant negative impacts while the change in arable and permanent land was positively related to the growth of agricultural production and food production in 28 developing countries from 1971 to 1980. These results emphasize the importance of ‘getting prices right’ and implementation of sustainable land and water management practices if future growth in food and agricultural output is to be realized and sustained in developing countries.     

LABOUR MARKET DUALISM,THREAT OF EVICTION AND CROPSHARE TENANCY

Landlords in some countries commonly adopt a policy of short-term leasing such that their tenants perpetually face a threat of termination of the contracts if their performance is not satisfactory. By explicitly modelling the threat of termination in a multi-period framework, this paper demonstrates that: (a) a landlord may prefer a landed rather than a landless tenant, (b) although tenants are free to choose the amount of land for cropsharing, the marginal product of land is not driven down to zero, and (c) the efficiency of cropshare cultivation may not be ranked unambiguously against owner or wage cultivation.     

Heterogeneous Risk Preferences,Discount Rates and Land Contract Choice in Ethiopia

This paper analyses the role of risk and rate of time preference in the choice of land contracts. The analysis builds on the risk‐sharing and imperfect market explanations of contract choice. Unique data from Ethiopia, which contain land contract information and experimental risk and rate of time preference measures on matched landlord–tenant partners, are employed in the empirical analysis. The results show that landlord and tenant time preferences are significant determinants of contract choice. For landlords (but not tenants), risk preference is also significant, indicating the importance of financial constraints and production risk in the determination of contract choice. The results are of particular relevance to land market policy in Ethiopia, where production is risk‐prone, financial markets are imperfect, and where there is a major need for the development of vibrant land rental markets.     

Dial “A” for agriculture: a review of information and communication technologies for agricultural extension in developing countries

Agriculture can serve as an important engine for economic growth in developing countries, yet yields in these countries have lagged far behind those in developed countries for decades. One potential mechanism for increasing yields is the use of improved agricultural technologies, such as fertilizers, seeds, and cropping techniques. Public sector programs have attempted to overcome information‐related barriers to technological adoption by providing agricultural extension services. While such programs have been widely criticized for their limited scale, sustainability, and impact, the rapid spread of mobile phone coverage in developing countries provides a unique opportunity to facilitate technological adoption via information and communication technology (ICT)‐based extension programs. This article outlines the potential mechanisms through which ICT could facilitate agricultural adoption and the provision of extension services in developing countries. It then reviews existing programs using ICT for agriculture, categorized by the mechanism (voice, text, internet, and mobile money transfers) and the type of services provided. Finally, we identify potential constraints to such programs in terms of design and implementation, and conclude with some recommendations for implementing field‐based research on the impact of these programs on farmers’ knowledge, technological adoption, and welfare.     

Agriculture's terms of trade: issues and implications

The article addresses (1) the issue of what agricultural commodity prices should be compared to if we are concerned with the welfare of agriculturalists, (2) the general absence of product quality adjustment when analysis is undertaken comparing agricultural to manufactured goods prices, (3) the extent to which energy prices are or will be the driver of both manufactured and agricultural prices, and (4) the importance of considering agriculture's terms of trade (TOT) against the service sector, since the service sector is typically the largest in the economy. It reflects on the basic question of whether the widespread perception “that agriculture's TOT secularly decline” is correct.     

Links between economic liberalization and rural resource degradation in the developing regions

This paper examines evidence of the effects of economic liberalization and globalization on rural resource degradation in developing countries. The principal resource effects of concern are processes of land use change leading to forestland conversion, degradation and deforestation. The main trends in globalization of interest are trade liberalization and economy-wide reforms in developing countries that have 'opened up' the agroindustrial sectors, thus increasing their export-orientation. Such reforms have clearly spurred agroindustrialization, rural development and economic growth, but there is also concern that there may be direct and indirect impacts on rural resource degradation. The direct impacts may occur as increased agricultural activity leads to conversion of forests and increased land degradation from 'unsustainable' production methods. However, there may also be indirect effects if agroindustrial development displaces landless, near-landless and rural poor generally, who then migrate to marginal agricultural lands and forest frontier regions. This paper explores these direct and indirect effects of globalization and agroindustrialization on rural resource degradation both generally, plus through examining case study evidence. The paper focuses in particular on the examples of structural adjustment, trade liberalization and agricultural development in Ghana, and maize sector liberalization in Mexico under North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).     

Bargaining and Efficiency in Sharecropping

In this paper the Nash bargaining solution is used to derive solutions for the rental share and labour input in sharecropping. The bargaining is modeled as a two‐stage process. First there is a bargain about the rental share, and then a bargain about labour input. The power of the landlord to ensure an outcome favourable to himself may differ in the two stages. By imposing particular assumptions about this bargaining power, some popular models of sharecropping, that have been treated as completely separate in the literature, can be derived as special cases in our model. However, we also generate a new class of models. It is also demonstrated that it is not the tenant's influence in the labour input decision per se which causes inefficiency in sharecropping, but differences in the tenant's influence over different issues in the contract. This is in contrast to the popular view which states that if the tenant controls the level of labour input, sharecropping will result in an inefficient resource allocation.     

发展中国家农村剩余劳动力就业问题研究

二元经济结构是发展中国家的基本特征。二元经济结构的存在意味着发达的工业部门与传统落后的农业部门同时并存,也意味着在农村地区将长期存在一定的剩余劳动力需要向现代工业部门转移。在利用刘易斯劳动力流动模式的基础上,结合发展中国家的技术战略,提出了发展中国家应采取结合实际引进适用技术和国外资金,增加人力资本投资,促进农业产业化等措施,最终解决农业剩余劳动力的就业问题。     

The promise (and pitfalls) of ICT for agriculture initiatives

The widespread growth of information and telecommunication technologies (ICTs) in rural areas of developing countries offers new opportunities to provide more timely and low‐cost information services to farmers, as well as assist in coordinating agricultural agents. Over the past decade, the number of public and private sector initiatives in this space has increased substantially, with over 140 deployments worldwide in 2015. While there is substantial potential for such services to address farmers’ and traders’ information and credit market constraints, economic research suggests that the impacts of such services on agricultural adoption, behavior and welfare is mixed. While this can, in part, be explained by the degree of the information asymmetry and the presence of other market failures in different contexts, research from other disciplines provides additional insights into these findings. In particular, work in the domain of human–computer interaction (HCI) focuses heavily on users’ interaction and experience with a given technology, thus explaining why users may not fully engage with ICT‐based agricultural interfaces. Furthermore, sociological and anthropological approaches study the provision of information and trust and how these may be altered by ICT platforms. Drawing upon these disciplines, we suggest that future ICT for agriculture initiatives should first seek to better understand the information and complementary market failures in a given context, in order to better understand whether information is a binding constraint. Second, even if information is missing, the information services provided should be of high quality and from a trusted source, which can be a challenge with some ICT platforms. Finally, such services should be delivered via platforms that build upon local ICT access and usage, paying particular attention to the gender digital divide.     

Dual Technological Development in Botswana Agriculture: A Stochastic Input Distance Function Approach

To improve the welfare of the rural poor and keep them in the countryside, the government of Botswana has been spending 40% of the value of agricultural GDP on agricultural support services. But can investment make smallholder agriculture prosperous in such adverse conditions? This paper derives an answer by applying a two‐output six‐input stochastic translog distance function, with inefficiency effects and biased technical change to panel data for the 18 districts and the commercial agricultural sector, from 1979 to 1996. This model demonstrates that herds are the most important input, followed by draft power, land and seeds. Multilateral indices for technical change, technical efficiency and total factor productivity (TFP) show that the technology level of the commercial agricultural sector is more than six times that of traditional agriculture and that the gap has been increasing, due to technological regression in traditional agriculture and modest progress in commercial agriculture. Since the levels of efficiency are similar, the same pattern is repeated by the TFP indices. This result highlights the policy dilemma of the trade‐off between efficiency and equity objectives.     

A review of the economic impact of malaria in agricultural development

This paper surveys the linkages between malaria and agriculture, focusing on the economic impacts of the disease. We adopt Negin's (2005) conceptual framework to examine the potential impacts of malaria in the agricultural sector, including both direct and indirect impacts. In addition to health care costs, malaria causes loss of agricultural labor and slows adoption of improved practices in agriculture. Furthermore, some agricultural practices and development interventions are known to facilitate the spread of malaria, exacerbating its impacts. Given the importance of both agriculture and malaria in developing countries, especially in Africa, the interaction between them could be a significant factor in economic growth. The review identifies gaps in past research on this topic. A better understanding of malaria's impact on agricultural productivity, coupled with efforts to strengthen capacity to deal with malaria, would enhance policies and programs aimed at combating malaria and curbing its impacts on agricultural productivity.     

Welfare Impacts of Cross-Country Spillovers in Agricultural Research

The welfare implications of intellectual property protection (IPP) for private sector agricultural research are analyzed, focusing on the realistic cases where countries provide different IPP levels, technology spills over across countries, and the public sector is involved in research. A model is developed to determine who benefits from, and who should pay for, the associated research. The article contains some interesting results on the implications of a harmonization of IPP policies through multilateral agreements or via technology that allows research firms to prevent the copying of plants and animals that express traits that have emerged from their research.     

FARM ADJUSTMENT AND THE ROLE OF GOVERNMENT*

The problem of low income farms in Australia is examined in a dynamic context of overall farm adjustment. It is suggested that the pace of agricultural adjustment has been and is too slow, in the light of current and prospective market and cost trends. Consideration is given to both the case for, and the possibilities of, government action and the relationship of on?-farm adjustment to the adjustment needs of the economic and the social infrastructure on the agricultural sector.     

社区自然资源管理的基本要素及政府的作用

社区自然资源管理作为一种将自然资源的可持续利用与社区居民的经济及福利水平提高相结合的管理方式得到了很多国家的重视,特别是发展中国家,在实践中也摸索出一些经验教训。社区自然资源管理突出了社区成员在资源管理整个过程的参与及主体地位,强调社区的决策管理权和受益权。通过简要介绍社区自然资源管理的概念及其基本要素,并分析政府在社区资源管理模式中应发挥的作用,希望对中国资源管理的可持续发展有所借鉴。     

Land Market Imperfections and Agricultural Policy Impacts in the New EU Member States: A Partial Equilibrium Analysis

This article analyses how transaction costs and imperfect competition in the land market affect the welfare effects of agricultural subsidies in the new Eastern Member States of the European Union. Benefits of land subsidies end up with landowners in new Eastern Member States also with imperfections in the new Eastern Member States land markets. With unequal access to subsidies, small tenant farmers may even lose out from the subsidies. Decoupling of payments shifts policy rents to farmers, but constrains productivity-enhancing restructuring. Using reserve entitlements to mitigate this effect reduces the intended benefits on distortions and target efficiency.     

GOVERNMENT EXPENDITURE ON AGRICULTURE AND AGRICULTURAL PERFORMANCE IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES: AN EMPIRICAL EVALUTION

In recent years, new prominence has been assigned to the effects of non-price measures on the performance of the agricultural sector in developing countries. Nevertheless, the contribution of government expenditure to agricultural output growth has not received its due attention. This paper endeavours to estimate the impact of government expenditure (on agriculture) on the performance of the agricultural sector. An inter-country production function is estimated for a sample of thirty-five developing countries, pooling cross-section and time-series data over the 1974-84 period. The influence of instability in government expenditure on agriculture and on agricultural growth is also assessed. The results show that government expenditure policies are of vital importance in influencing the performance of the agricultural sector. It was also found that instability in government expenditure is a deterrent to agricultural output growth.     

How do informal farmland rental markets affect smallholders’ well‐being? Evidence from a matched tenant–landlord survey in Malawi

We estimate the efficiency and equity returns to farmland rental markets in Malawi using a matched tenant–landlord survey of smallholder farm households in four districts. Our sample allows us to more fully observe the landlord side of the rental market, which is almost always missing in previous studies. Our results suggest that land rental markets promote efficiency by facilitating a net transfer of land to more productive farmers. We also find that land rental markets promote equity as conventionally defined in the land markets literature, that is, by transferring land from land‐rich households to land‐poor households, and from labor‐poor to labor‐rich households. However, our study identifies some important challenges for land rental markets in this context. First, we find that tenants in our sample are wealthier than their landlord counterpart on average in all dimensions other than landholding. In addition, most landlords report the motive for renting out their land as either the need for immediate cash, or the lack of labor and/or capital to cultivate the plot that was rented out. These findings align with concerns about potential “stress renting” by poor landlords and suggest the value of defining equity along a broader set of dimensions other than simply equalizing the distribution of farmland and labor.     

Conditioning trends shaping the agricultural and rural landscape in Africa

African countries continue to face deepening food crises that have been accentuated by the global food, energy, and financial crises. This situation is part of a long‐term structural problem: decades of under‐investments in agricultural sector and poor policies of support for smallholder farmers who form the bulk of the farming population. The inability of these farmers to achieve a supply response when commodity prices were high and market access was less of a problem suggests that there are multiple sets of binding constraints that continue to limit the potential of agricultural growth to reduce food security and poverty on the continent. This article reviews some of the historical trends that have hampered the performance of the agriculture sector. In addition, it reviews the impacts of more positive trends that could stimulate agricultural growth in Africa that could change the African agricultural landscape. The article however warns that there are more recent global developments and some continental challenges that could prevent or slow agricultural growth. These include the global financial crisis, public sector investments, inequities in global agricultural development policies, rush for agricultural lands by foreign investors, domestic commercial financing markets, climate change, and emerging carbon markets. The article argues that while opportunities for accelerated growth exists for African agriculture, new sets of policy instruments will be needed to support smallholder farmers to access new agricultural technologies, finance, reduce impacts of climate change, and adopt sustainable land use practices that can allow them to benefit from emerging global carbon markets.     

Foreign Aid and the Quest for Poverty Reduction: Is Aid to Agriculture Effective?

Development statistics estimate that three quarters of the poor live in rural areas and most of them depend on agriculture and related activities for their livelihood. Consequently, research focusing on economic growth and poverty reduction has found that sustainable rapid transition out of poverty requires a special emphasis on the agricultural sector. This study contributes to the debate on aid effectiveness by disaggregating total aid into subcategories and specifically investigating the relationship between aid given to the agricultural sector and poverty reduction. If agricultural development is more effective in reducing poverty than some other types of development, then foreign aid directed towards agriculture may be more efficient in increasing the well‐being of the poor than aid directed to some other sectors or uses. Our analysis uses panel data for developing aid recipient countries to empirically test this relationship. We find a significant relationship between agricultural aid and poverty reduction in our estimates.