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DEDICATION & INTENT OF THE AUTHOR CHAPTER 3 POLICIES IN 20TH CENTURY CHAPTER 4 CAPACITY BUILDING– NARP CHAPTER 7 AGRICULTURE AND ECONOMICS CHAPTER 8 AGRICULTURAL GROWTH AND EMPLOYMENT CHAPTER 9 EGYPT’S FUTURE—HORTICULTURE
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Agriculture for Development -- A Way of LifeWorld Development Report for 2008In announcing
" According to Nathaniel Don Marquez (126), Asian NGO Coalition for Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (ANGOC) the theme reflects the importance and prominence of agriculture. Many international summits and conferences have declared that there is an urgency to save agriculture from its demise. Beyond policy changes, the restructuring of global governance and institutional reforms are needed so that commitments are translated into actions leading to a renewed interest in agriculture and a return to the basic objective of food security. Unless there is a fundamental shift in the framework or paradigm in which agriculture is currently operated, then agriculture will lead to the dissolution of small farming households. Indeed, agriculture is the bedrock of human civilization. For as long as food security and agricultural productivity continue to be measured by money and markets, it will continue to pull young people away from agricultural life. A Way of Life or a Pathway to PovertyAgricultural development has come to mean increasing productivity alone. To speak of agriculture however, is to speak of farmers. For as Tony Quizon puts it, “development is not about money, it is about people.” By definition, farmers include resource poor cultivators, pastoralists, fisher folk, indigenous peoples, women and agricultural laborers. Agriculture is beyond merely an instrument for development, for millions of poor farmers, it is a way of life. Hence, for farmers, it is addressing the needs of the persons rather than merely the productivity of the farm. It is addressing food security and self-sufficiency as the main ticket to survival of a nation as growth is addressed. It is assuring equity instead of mere national economic growth beneficial to and controlled by a few at the expense of the majority. As Fr. Francis Lucas rightly observes, small farmers feel that farming is a condemnation to poverty, destitution and death. The poor are isolated; they are remote from centers of power and government. They remain largely unorganized with a lack of power. Their access to land, water, technology and other services is tenuous at best. They are the first victims of calamities and political upheavals. Rather than sustaining life, the current global competition for agriculture might mean the extinction of small farmers and farming. Poverty is the result – not of scarcity, but of mal distribution of resources and power. Compounding the woes is that the small food producers – – who remain most vulnerable to hunger and poverty, are landlessness or limited access to productive land. In most rural areas, land remains a major source/determinant of wealth; it is a symbol of prestige and a means to power. The current crisis of agriculture and farming communities stems from three major trends which exacerbate poverty and inequity: · first, the promotion of Green Revolution technology without regard for its social and ecological consequences; · second, the surrender of agriculture policies and farming communities to strategies aimed at rapid urban industrialization; and · third, indiscriminate liberalization policies which allow the entry and dominance of extremely powerful multinational agribusinesses.
As to the first trend, while the increase of production from the Green Revolution has benefited developed countries and favorable regions of developing countries, these yield increases unfortunately have not reached the rural poor. Green Revolution requires substantial external inputs such as chemical fertilizers and pesticides. While the technology provided yield increases at the start, it was not sustainable in the long term. NGOs criticized the narrow approach of relying mainly on Green Revolution technologies as they are assessed to be environmentally unsustainable and discriminatory to resource poor farmers. Many new agricultural technologies ignore the complexities of rural life, as well as the cultural and social differences among communities. Indigenous agricultural practices and knowledge that were developed over many generations have given way to the simplified, standardized techniques of the green revolution. The strong sense of values that underpinned traditional agriculture have been overthrown by a production system that is alienated from the community. Current government policies emphasize meeting urbanization needs and relegate agriculture to the position of support sector. Voices of concern have been raised about the growing bias against agriculture in favor of industrialization, which is thought to be inherent to economic transformation. Agriculture versus IndustrializationAgriculture is viewed merely as a support sector for
industry. There is thus an evident As to the liberalization of agriculture, such phenomenon has resulted in trade relations between the big players from the North and the small Southern players becoming even more lopsided. Unfortunately, countries of the South are severely disadvantaged. While their agricultural subsidies are scrapped, and their agricultural trade is liberalized, heavy subsidization of agriculture continues in the North. This leads to massive displacement of agricultural producers, particularly staple food producers, who comprise the bulk of farmers in developing countries. The lure of growing more lucrative luxury crops and non-food items over staple crops increasingly threatens domestic food security. The inclusion of the Agreement on Agriculture under the WTO intensified the dependence of small producers on the external market for production inputs and consequently the already heavy reliance on food imports due to the shifting of land and resources away from food crop production towards export oriented cash crop production. The flooding of local markets with cheap imported (and dumped) food also discourages local production. The Agreement on Agriculture under the WTO aimed to facilitate the process towards a freer flow of agricultural products among countries. Governments committed to remove quotas, subsidies and tariffs over a period of time. Unfortunately, the current agreement and how it is implemented favored the developed countries to the detriment of developing countries. Agriculture in developed countries continues to be heavily subsidized allowing them to market their products at cheaper price. Moreover, trade barriers are still in place restricting the flow of agricultural products especially those coming from developing countries. Imperatives of the FutureIt is imperative that land, water, biodiversity and intellectual practices be under the democratic control of those who produce food. In the run-up to the World Food Summit in April 1996, about 101 NGOs from Asia-Pacific raised the following fundamental principles in reviving agriculture and attaining food security saying agriculture must be: · built on a vision centered on the integrity of the local farming communities · based on food security and sufficiency of the national community · implemented via strategies that promote social equity, ecological sustainability, people’s empowerment and gender balance According to Thirtle et al. (93) the literature provides overwhelming theoretical and empirical evidence that agricultural growth is essential, especially in the poorer developing countries. It identifies the diverse roles that agriculture plays in the process of growth and development on the one hand, and the link between economy-wide growth and poverty alleviation on the other. Agricultural productivity growth has an impact on GDP growth, both directly and through agriculture’s linkages with the broader economy, that generate increases in non-farm income. Both agricultural growth and GDP growth have impacts on inequality, poverty, and nutrition. For Egypt there can be no doubt, Agriculture is an essential and basic part of the economy. http://www.landcoalition.org/pdf/07_ev_angoc_wdr2008.pdf.
Agricultural Development is Fundamental to Economic DevelopmentPeter McPherson, President, NASULGC, USA Agricultural development is fundamental to any broad-based economic development on the African continent and agriculture has been shown to produce more equitable growth in personal income than other forms of development. Generating and extending research, knowledge and technology, building African human capacity to conduct research and supporting the capacity of institutions to produce creative and productive people is essential to the process. In summary, Africa faces a multitude of challenges that will affect how successful development efforts will be. Clearly, agriculture is key to making that development successful. Successful agricultural development is most directly achieved through investment in human and institutional capacity that will generate the knowledge, technologies and leaders to eradicate famine and food shortages, and build economies that support stable and democratic societies in Africa. Institute (IFPRI) study shows that agriculture is truly an important engine of growth for Africa. While its role may vary among countries depending on a diversity of conditions, agriculture is an especially strong force in poverty reduction, because it affects the rural poor who are a large component of the poor of Africa. The study concludes “most African countries cannot significantly reduce poverty, increase per capita incomes, and transform into modern economies without focusing on agricultural development.” This conclusion is similar to that of another study of a broad range of developing countries that found that increasing agricultural productivity is the most efficient way to reduce poverty and inequality. Yet another study of 62 developing countries demonstrates the power of agricultural development to increase national economic growth. The study shows that changes in agricultural productivity explained 54 percent of the growth in GDP per worker and that this increased efficiency, released labor from agriculture to other sectors that accounted for another 29 percent of the GDP growth. The remaining 17 percent of GDP growth is from non-agricultural increases. Food security is achieved by addressing a wide range of constraints. Some of these constraints are more obvious than others and more amenable to our development approaches. While connection to markets, trade policy and other components of what is termed an “enabling environment” are important elements to national development they will depend on two factors. First and foremost, they depend on well-trained, visionary indigenous people to design, implement and support them. In short, highly educated human capital is essential. Second, we need to increase agricultural productivity. Most of the recent gains in agricultural production in Africa have resulted from expanding the area of land cultivated and not increasing the production per unit of land area. The implications are not just a decline in per acre production efficiency but a use of more marginal land with ever increasing negative impacts on the natural resource base. Increases in efficiency per acre are the result of improved technologies and access to inputs. The sustainable way to increase efficiencies is to create Africa capacity to generate new technologies; that is build the human capacity and build the institutions that generate that capacity—the universities and the agricultural research institutes. We need to make such investments. Evidence from rural Uganda indicates that public investments in agricultural R&D had the highest impact on poverty reduction of development investments throughout the 1990s. In addition to financial resources, agricultural innovation requires human capital and, therefore, sustaining and improving upon advances in agricultural R&D requires concurrent investments in general education. Higher Education and research institutes generate knowledge that has economic impact, particularly in agriculture. In a study of more than 1,800 rates of return to research in agriculture the median of the rate of return estimates was 48 percent per year for research, 62.9 percent for extension studies, 37 percent for studies that combined research and extension jointly, and 44.3 percent for all studies combined; a profitable investment by any standards but particularly so for a developing country. A presentation by Peter McPherson, President, National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Universities of the United States, before the United States House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs, Subcommittee on Africa and Global Health References used in the complete presentation before the Committee on Foreign Affairs1. Diao et al. 2006. The role of development: implications for Sub-Saharan Africa. DSGD Discussion Paper No. 29, IFPRI, Washington, D.C. 2. Bourguignon, F., and Morrisson, C. 1998. “Inequality and Development: The Role of Dualism”, Journal of Development Economics, 57(2), 233-258. 3. Gollin, D., Parente, S., and Rogerson, R. 2002. “The Role of Agriculture in Development”, American Economic Review, 92(2): 160-164. 4. Fan, S., Zhang, X., and Rao, N. 2004. “Public Expenditure, Growth and Poverty Reduction in Rural Uganda.” Development Strategy and Governance Discussion Paper No.4, IFPRI: Washington, DC. 5. Alston et al. 2000. A Meta analysis of rates of return of agricultural R&D. IFPRI Research Report 113, Washington, DC.
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