IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/qld/uqcepa/20.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Something of a Paradox: The Curious Neglect of Agriculture in Development

Author

Abstract

This paper argues that investment in agriculture has a large and continuing developmental importance in terms of both economic growth and poverty reduction. Moreover, targeted public resources have proven to be indispensable in achieving these results. Both arguments are supported with novel analyses which update and strengthen the traditional case for agriculture-led development with public-sector involvement. But despite the strong case for agriculture-led development strategies, the authors find that over the last three decades the financial resources allocated towards this sector have strongly declined. It is suggested that a shift towards new development paradigms since 1980 might be a significant explanation for this apparent Agricultural Paradox. This conjecture is tested with data on market reform impacts, PRSP contents and analyses of the intellectual resources devoted to the study of agriculture in development by both practitioners and researchers. The authors conclude with a critical discussion of these disturbing trends.

Suggested Citation

  • Derek D. Headey & Dirk Bezemer, 2006. "Something of a Paradox: The Curious Neglect of Agriculture in Development," CEPA Working Papers Series WP012006, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    • Handle: RePEc:qld:uqcepa:20
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://economics.uq.edu.au/files/5307/WP012006.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. William S. Sessions, 1990. "Washington," Challenge, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 33(4), pages 57-59, July.
    2. Thirtle, Colin & Lin, Lin & Piesse, Jenifer, 2003. "The Impact of Research-Led Agricultural Productivity Growth on Poverty Reduction in Africa, Asia and Latin America," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 31(12), pages 1959-1975, December.
    3. Krueger, Anne O, 1974. "The Political Economy of the Rent-Seeking Society," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 64(3), pages 291-303, June.
    4. Harris, John R & Todaro, Michael P, 1970. "Migration, Unemployment & Development: A Two-Sector Analysis," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 60(1), pages 126-142, March.
    5. Derek D. Headey & D.S. Prasada Rao & Mohammad Alauddin, 2005. "Explaining Agricultural Productivity Levels and Growth: An International Perspective," CEPA Working Papers Series WP022005, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    6. Dorward, Andrew & Kydd, Jonathan & Morrison, Jamie & Urey, Ian, 2004. "A Policy Agenda for Pro-Poor Agricultural Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 73-89, January.
    7. Adelman, Irma & Morris, Cynthia Taft, 1997. "Editorial: Development history and its implications for development theory," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 25(6), pages 831-840, June.
    8. Linsu Kim, 1999. "Learning and Innovation in Economic Development," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 1690.
    9. Daniel Start, 2001. "The Rise and Fall of the Rural Non‐farm Economy: Poverty Impacts and Policy Options," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 19(4), pages 491-505, December.
    10. Tim Coelli & Shannon Walding, 2005. "Performance Measurement in the Australian Water Supply Industry," CEPA Working Papers Series WP012005, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Goksel Armagan & Altug Ozden & Selim Bekcioglu, 2010. "Efficiency and total factor productivity of crop production at NUTS1 level in Turkey: Malmquist index approach," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 44(3), pages 573-581, April.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bezemer, Dirk & Headey, Derek, 2008. "Agriculture, Development, and Urban Bias," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(8), pages 1342-1364, August.
    2. Pierre Malgrange & Patrick Plane, 2008. "Économie du développement et de la transition : présentation générale," Economie & Prévision, La Documentation Française, vol. 0(5), pages 1-10.
    3. Cohen, Joseph N., 2008. "Managing the Faustian bargain: monetary autonomy in the pursuit of development in Eastern Europe and Latin America," MPRA Paper 22435, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Knight, J.B. & Sabot, R.H., 1988. "Lewis Through A Looking Glass: Public Sector Employment, Rent-Seeking And Economic Growth," Center for Development Economics 108, Department of Economics, Williams College.
    5. Dorward, Andrew & Kydd, Jonathan & Poulton, Colin, 2004. "Market and Coordination Failures in Poor Rural Economies: Policy Implications for Agricultural and Rural Development," 2004 Inaugural Symposium, December 6-8, 2004, Nairobi, Kenya 9535, African Association of Agricultural Economists (AAAE).
    6. Diao, Xinshen & Hazell, Peter & Resnick, Danielle & Thurlow, James, 2006. "The role of agriculture in development: implications for Sub-Saharan Africa," DSGD discussion papers 29, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    7. Rainer Klump & César Miralles Cabrera, 2008. "Biased Technological Change in Agriculture: The Hayami-Ruttan Hypothesis Revisited," DEGIT Conference Papers c013_016, DEGIT, Dynamics, Economic Growth, and International Trade.
    8. Gonzalez Corzo, Mario, 2013. "Los efectos de las transformaciones agrícolas en los antiguos países socialistas: Algunas consideraciones para Cuba [The effects of agricultural transformations in former socialist countries: Some ," MPRA Paper 60458, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Karl Ove Moene & Asbjorn Rodseth, 1991. "Nobel Laureate: Trygve Haavelmo," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 5(3), pages 175-192, Summer.
    10. Bhalotra, Sonia., 2003. "The impact of economic liberalization on employment and wages in India," ILO Working Papers 993650543402676, International Labour Organization.
    11. Hazell, Peter B.R., 2009. "The Asian Green Revolution:," IFPRI discussion papers 911, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    12. Dorward, Andrew & Kydd, Jonathan, 2003. "Policy Reform in Sub Saharan Africa," Policy Reform and Adjustment Workshop, October 23-25, 2003, Imperial College London, Wye Campus 15749, International Agricultural Policy Reform and Adjustment Project (IAPRAP).
    13. Deininger, Klaus & Jin, Songqing & Sur, Mona, 2007. "Sri Lanka's Rural Non-Farm Economy: Removing Constraints to Pro-Poor Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 2056-2078, December.
    14. Dorward, Andrew & Kydd, Jonathan & Morrison, Jamie & Urey, Ian, 2004. "A Policy Agenda for Pro-Poor Agricultural Growth," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 32(1), pages 73-89, January.
    15. Naqvi, Syed Nawab Haider, 1996. "The significance of development economics," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(6), pages 975-987, June.
    16. Jonathan Kydd & Andrew Dorward, 2004. "Implications of market and coordination failures for rural development in least developed countries," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 16(7), pages 951-970.
    17. Bethuel Kinuthia & Abdelkrim Araar & Laura Barasa & Stephene Maende & Faith Mariera, 2019. "Off-Farm Participation, Agricultural Production and Farmers’ Welfare in Tanzania and Uganda," Working Papers PMMA 2019-01, PEP-PMMA.
    18. Jiancai Pi & Pengqing Zhang, 2017. "Social conflict and wage inequality," Journal of Economics, Springer, vol. 121(1), pages 29-49, May.
    19. Kuiper, Marijke H. & Meijerink, Gerdien W. & Eaton, Derek J.F., 2006. "Rural Livelihoods: Interplay Between Farm Activities, Non-farm Activities and the Resource Base," 2006 Annual Meeting, August 12-18, 2006, Queensland, Australia 25442, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    20. Derek Headey, 2007. "What Professor Rodrik Means by Policy Reform: Appraising a Post-Washington Paradigm," CEPA Working Papers Series WP052007, School of Economics, University of Queensland, Australia.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:qld:uqcepa:20. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SOE IT (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/decuqau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.