Agricultural Transformations and Rural Development

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Agricultural Transformations and Rural Development
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Agricultural Systems

• Useful to view agriculture in a systems
  framework inputs, outputs and linkages
• Inputs- labor, fertilizer, seeds, land
  preparation, land quality and tenure
• Outputs- production in form of mature crops and
  income earned and allocated
• Linkages- labor intensity gt type of crop (rice,
  rubber, etc) land sizegtincome earned and
  traditional system
• But inputs, outputs are linked through three
  overlapping milieu or environments

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Agricultural Systems

• A- Physical - Ecosystem- especially climate
  (precipitation), soil and vegetation
• B- Behavioral - how ecosystem is
  perceived-physical and behavioral may be in
  conflict
• C- Operational - culture, values, class
  structures, institutions and tradition, political
  system, technology level-farm management, land
  tenure-all influence and govern machinery of
  production, consumption and exchange

B-Behavioral Environment
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Agrarian Structure

• Agrarian structure refers to ways in which
  agricultural system is developed on the land and
  includes land ownership, cropping system, and
  institutions
• Land tenure- who owns or controls the land
• Communal tenure- land held by village where
  villagers enjoy usufruct (right to use and
  profit)
• Latifundia large estates where wage laborers are
  employed by private sector firms (agri-business),
  or plantations held by public sector
• Freehold- outright ownership with land being
  transferred and divided equally among (usually
  males)
• Tenancy- farmers pay owners for use of land
  either in cash or kind (production)

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Forms of Agriculturehttp//www.askasia.org/frclas
rm/lessplan/l000008.htm

• Wet rice (sawah or padi) cultivation- rice grown
  in an embanked field relying on natural rainfall
  or irrigation. Highly labor intensive and
  naturally fertile. Irrigation adds fertility
  through deposition of material in suspension.
  Capable of involution and highly impacted by the
  Green Revolution- hybrid seeds, fertilizers and
  pesticides used to enhance productivity but
  assumes abundant water

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Green Revolution

• Green Revolution - production revolution in
  grains associated with discovery of new hybrid
  seed varieties of wheat, rice, and corn
• Resulted in high farm yields and allow double and
  triple cropping due to rapid maturity
• But such seeds are dependent upon expensive
  inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides and above
  all require adequate water.
• Produces higher incomes and may allow family
  members to divert to other non-farm occupations

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Plantation or Estate Agriculture

• Plantation or Estate Agriculture- foreign capital
  or public sector capital large scale with
  rubber, oil palm, coffee and sugar cane being
  dominant high labor requirements-labor supply
  problems stimulated by Western now Eastern
  demand as well significant capital
  investment-planting, processing, re-planting

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Rubber Plantations

• Originally collected from wild trees in South
  America, now 90 of rubber production comes from
  plantations of rubber trees in Southeast Asia.
• Thailand (southern) is largest producer where
  small holdings are dominant Malaysia, Indonesia
  and Nigeria
• Strong prices for latex have produced a boom
• Huge demand from Chinarubber tires and other
  products as well as global demand for rubber
  gloves (HIV)

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Oil Palm Plantations

• Oil palm originally from West Africa has
  overtaken rubber in many nations
• Malaysia currently accounts for 51 of world
  palm oil production and 62 of world exports
• Other producers are Indonesia, Nigeria, Ivory
  Coast and Colombia
• Numerous food and non-food applications frying
  media margarines, shortenings, soap,
  oleochemicals and other products
• Nutritional and health value?

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Sedentary
Dry Farming

• Sedentary dry farming- mostly smallholders
  growing cereal grains usually millets and
  sorghums
• Sahel countries- Burkina Faso Chad, Mali, Niger,
  Sudan- desertification and aridity
• Occasionally grown under irrigation where
  population density is generally low

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Shifting Agriculture

• Shifting cultivation- sometimes referred to as
  swidden and means occupancy of the land
  interrupted by lengthy rest periods, clearing
  field and burning vegetation, sowing food crops
  supports only a small population extensive type
  of agriculture diversity of crops planted to
  insure against natural hazard
• Shifting cultivation usually starts with cutting
  trees and a fire which clears a spot for crop
  production (L)
• In the ideal case, shifting cultivation is a
  cycle where farmers come back to the original
  place after a couple of years. The picture shows
  a newly prepared land in the center. In the
  background is untouched forest, in the foreground
  the piece of land which has been left idle to
  re-growth of a secondary forest from the previous
  cropping cycle, and on the right the secondary
  growth awaiting cultivation during the next
  cropping cycle.(R)

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Fires, Slash and Burn and Indonesia

• Slash/burn practiced in Borneo by Dayaks w/o
  creating ecological crisis
• Burning has become excessive
• Clearing old rubber plantations is major cause of
  firesillegal but cheap
• But local people also clear by fire as they farm
  larger areas
• In dry years fire and smoke damage have huge
  consequences for property and health and the
  ecology of the forest

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Highland Market Gardens

• High elevation areas allow crops carrots,
  tomatoes, cabbage, flowers
• Labor intensive vegetable or tea production for
  urban markets
• Well organized and export orientation
• Examples Cameron Highlands, Malaysia Berastagi,
  Sumatra Baguio, Philippines Kandy, Sri Lanka

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Constraints on Rural Developing World Agriculture

• Small size of farms limit productivity of labor
• Reduction in size of land parcels under
  inheritance tends to increase tenancy
• Weak local or regional markets
• Expensive inputs unless subsidized by government
• Farm to market transport often poor and may be
  seasonal- collapsing in the wet season

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture in Latin America,
Asia, and Africa

• Common characteristic is the position of the
  family farm in all three areas
• Latin America and Asia have very different
  heritages and cultures but peasant life is
  similar
• Rural cultivator whose prime aim is survival
• Farming techniques are scaled to his level of
  capital human and animal power rather than
  mechanization
• Food crops are dominant corn, rice and soybeans

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture Latin America

• But nature of agrarian existence differed
  dramatically
• Latin America- pattern of dualism known as
  latifundio (large land holdings gt 15 persons) and
  minifundio (smallest farms lt2 persons)
• Problem small number of latifundios control a
  large proportion of agriculture while vast number
  of minifundios scratch out existence
• Problem latifundios relatively inefficient
  because high proportion of land may be left idle
• Problem little reinvestment of profits to
  improve productivity

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture Latin America

• Land owners often value their holdings not for
  their contribution to national agricultural
  output but for power and prestige
• Many small farmers exist on benevolence and
  goodwill of landowner-permits them a meager
  living
• In return small farmers give up to 80 of
  production of output
• Tenant farmers may have to provide both output
  and free labor to the patron
• Improved agricultural productivity in LA means
  more than seeds, fertilizers, higher output
  prices, and improved marketing
• It means a reorganization of social and
  institutional structures for peasants to lift
  themselves up

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture Asia

• In LA- too much land under control of too few
  people
• In Asia- too many people crowded onto too little
  land
• Three forces have molded the traditional pattern
  of land ownership into its present condition
• 1. European rule-private property, rise of
  landlord and creation of individual land titles
• 2. Rise in power of the moneylender- with land
  titles land became a negotiable asset
• 3. Rapid growth of Asian populations- impact has
  been severe fragmentation as holdings shrink
  production falls below poverty level peasants
  forced to borrow at usurious rates large debts
  forced to pay high rents with scarce land labor
  abundant so wages are low Myrdals vicious
  circles of poverty!!

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture Africa

• As in LA and Asia, subsistence on small plots is
  typical, but organization is very different
• African agricultural systems dominated by three
  characteristics
• 1. Importance of subsistence farming in the
  village community
• 2. Existence of land in excess of immediate needs
  (allows shifting cultivation)
• 3. Rights of each family to have access to land
  and water in immediate area (if you do not belong
  to community you are excluded)

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Contrasting Peasant Agriculture Africa

• Low productivity subsistence is characteristic of
  most traditional African agricultureWhy?
• 1. Traditional tools and limited technology
  restrict area that can be planted- although land
  is available (Animal power restricted)
• 2. Small areas intensively cultivated- subject to
  diminishing returns and increased labor
  inputs-shifting cultivation appropriate?
• 3. Scarcity of labor during the growing
  season-planting and weeding. Only one rainy
  period over much of Africa, demand for workers at
  this time exceeds supply
• Net result is virtually constant level of
  agricultural output and labor productivity
  throughout Africa

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Off-Farm Employment

• Off-farm employment (OFE) is a critical yet
  imperfectly understood phenomenon
• Micro-level issues which address the nature of
  the employment, its prevalence and income impact
  must be further understood
• OFE is central in many household survival
  strategies and a substantial proportion of income
  may be derived from off-farm work

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The Location of Off Farm Employment

• Many families meet subsistence needs by producing
  crops on farm and working at off farm jobs
• The latter is often much more lucrative
• Off farm employment applies to two different
  situations
• 1. Local -e.g. working on a neighbors land or
  operating a small shop
• 2. Regional- e.g. coffee harvesting in another
  region, factory work and trader- vendor in nearby
  town

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Activity Forms in the Peasant Economy

• Productive activities of rural peasants -
  production for direct use in household (food
  processing, husking of grain, etc), non-farm
  income earning on farm (handicraft production),
  work on household farm (land prep, weeding,
  harvesting) and off-farm wage labor both farm
  (harvesting coffee) and non-farm (trishaw driver
  or factory worker).
• Reproductive activities of rural peasants - daily
  maintenance of the household cooking, sweeping,
  collecting firewood and water (Senegal), mending
  and washing clothes. These may be differentiated
  by biological (childbearing), generational
  (socialization and education of children), and
  daily (cooking, collecting water).
• .

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Peasants and Commodity Production

• Commodification or Commoditization - the
  increasing production of goods and services for
  the market (e.g. peanuts in Senegal).
• Petty commodity production - form of production
  in capitalism that combines capital and labor
  within small, typically household or family
  enterprises