Does new public management work in reforming the state's role in agricultural marketing in developing countries?

The research investigated the extent to which 'new public management' style reforms (in which the state confines itself to contracting, guiding, facilitating and financing in providing public services, rather than delivering them itself through civil service organizations) are successful in the institutional context of developing countries. Studies of reform of public services to agricultural marketing were conducted in Ghana, India, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe, with additional case studies in Ivory Coast and Kenya. While the broad direction of change is towards liberalized markets, reforms of government organizations in agricultural marketing are much slower than reforms to liberalize domestic trade, owing to low adaptive capacity in government organizations. Other findings are that reforms have consisted substantially of efforts to create independent agencies and private firms out of government departments and parastatals (corporatization and commercialization), with much less done to facilitate private sector development, or undertake contracting and new forms of regulation. Private sector development has suffered from underfunded infrastructure and receives little of substance from the reforms of government beyond market deregulation. Examples of successful innovation are identified which may have potential for replication. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.