The impact of genetically modified (GM) crops on the poor in developing countries is still the subject of controversy. While previous studies have examined direct productivity effects of Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) cotton and other GM crops, little is known about wider socioeconomic outcomes. We...

With declining Irish potato production trends in Kenya this paper identifies and analyses factors that influence the economic efficiency of smallholder Irish potato producers in Kenya by drawing on data from random sample of 130 smallholder farmers from Nyandarua North district. A dual...

Rising agricultural productivity in developing countries is crucial to ease the tension of increased population and haunting concern on food security. Nevertheless the soaring price of fertilizer and sluggish dissemination of improved seed varieties prohibit the poor to tap benefits from...

This paper presents an ex ante analysis of the private and social profitability of the introduction of Bt cotton for a major cotton producing area of northern Mozambique. Cotton is especially relevant to rural poverty reduction because smallholders often have few alternative cash earning...

We assess long-run patterns of global agricultural productivity growth in developing countries between 1970 and 2005 and examine the relationship between investments in technology capital and productivity. To measure agricultural total factor productivity (TFP) we employ a Solow-type growth...

Increased future demands for food, fibre and fuels from biomass can only be met if the available land and water resources on a global scale are used and managed as efficiently as possible. The main routes for making the global agricultural system more productive are through intensification and...

Capacity building is widely recognised as an important component of most research-for-development activities. However despite the fact that around $15 billion is spent annually on capacity building activities, there has been limited assessment of the economic returns to that investment. In...

This paper measures and compares total factor productivity growth in African agriculture under contemporaneous and sequential technology frontiers over the period 1970–2004. The paper further investigates the sources of agricultural productivity growth using a fixed-effects regression model...

Replaced with revised version of paper 07/29/09.

China’s agricultural sector has developed very rapidly in the past 30 years and agricultural technological progress is deemed one of the most substantial factors leading to its rapid agricultural GDP growth. In this paper, we assess the impacts of agricultural technological changes on regional...