Kidnapped

Recent battle cries to boost health care coverage for children might suggest help is on the way. Yet as politicians tout their new-found generosity, they've also been snatching away some government money for kids.     

Regional development in Transkei

This paper identifies the main issues that development in Transkei must address. These are job creation, food production and the upgrading of manpower productivity through appropriate education and training.

The first section gives statistical information on unemployment and food production. The second part discusses national development priorities and strategies as determined by the economic development planners and approved by the Government. The emphasis of the plan is small scale operations that can be operated and managed by the people themselves. The third section examines the development that is actually taking place against the approved national development priorities. Finally some of the policies and practices that are in conflict with what the country is seeking to achieve are highlighted.     

The new South African Constitution and its implications for development

The new constitutional dispensation will stimulate development activities for the Coloureds and Indians through community development and basic needs programmes which are mainly categorised as “own affairs”.

Local governmental institutions will become important additional instruments in this respect. The development backlog of Coloureds and Indians and its implications is sketched and the expectation is expressed that the dynamics of the new situation will lead to greater public expenditure for these needs. However, political demands for the realisation of development goals could outpace societal progress in terms of community development approaches, while the demographic distribution of Coloureds an Indians militates somewhat against their optimal drawing of benefit from decentralisation policies.     

Measurement of English farming technological change, 1523–1900

I have argued that for the period from 1661 to 1850, patent data in England were consistent in that no official changes in methods and standards of issuance occurred. Book data on titles published on farming production methods were similarly consistent from 1523 to the mid-19th century because the market for books developed gradually and the technology of printing was not substantially changed until the mid-19th century.My main point is that data on output of titles of books on farming productive techniques in England are useful measures of technological change. Books did have information on good production methods and could express productive ideas where a patent may not be issued. Further, the literacy rate of farmers was high so that books were likely an important source of ideas on farming production methods. Finally, the fluctuations in the book data were highly related to the fluctuations in the patent data, suggesting that a common set of factors caused those fluctuations. The high correlations between the detrended book and patent data indicate that if we accept patenting as a useful measure of technology we may also accept book title output of a technical nature as a good measure of technical change.I used the data for a simple analysis of the trend growth rate of agricultural technology in England from 1551 to 1850. While there is limited evidence to show that the subperiod 1651–1750 saw a slowing in the trend of development of farming technology, I argue that a division of the entire period into subperiods is too simplistic. A more fruitful approach would be an analysis of the underlying forces that determined the trend of development of the technology of English agriculture.The next step is an analysis of the forces that influenced technological development of English farming. From an economic point of view, market forces play an important role in influencing technology. Because such an analysis deserves careful consideration, I leave that to another paper (see Sullivan and Simon, 1983).