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South African agriculture at the crossroads : an empirical analysis of efficiency, technology and productivity / edited by Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl, and Nick Vink.
Lippincott Library HD2130.5 .A57 2000
By Request
- Format:
- Book
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Agriculture--Economic aspects--South Africa--History.
- Agriculture.
- Agricultural productivity--South Africa--History.
- Agricultural productivity.
- History.
- Agriculture--Economic aspects.
- South Africa.
- Physical Description:
- xix, 330 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm
- Place of Publication:
- New York : St. Martin's Press, 2000.
- Summary:
- This book examines the current state of South African agriculture and makes attempts at reform in context by looking at the past. It begins by explaining the historical process, which led to a dualistic agricultural sector, and the current policy process that attempts to resolve the inequalities and distortions. The policy discussion draws on the main part of the book, which is an empirical investigation of the measurement and explanation of efficiency and productivity change, which depend on technologies developed by R & D.
- Contents:
- 1 The Agrarian Structure and Empowerment: The Legacy / Masiphula Mbongwa, Nick Vink, Johan van Zyl 6
- Farming in nineteenth-century South Africa 7
- Segregation and support: 1910 to 1948 10
- 1910 to 1947: protection of 'white' agriculture 12
- 1948 to 1960: apartheid and the rural African household 13
- From 1960 to democratization in 1994 15
- 2 Agricultural Policy: Undoing the Legacy of the Past / Nick Vink, Johann Kirsten, Johan van Zyl 22
- Production, consumption and prices 23
- Agricultural policy during the 1980s 25
- Changes in agricultural policy 29
- Some effects of the changing farm policy 37
- 3 The Public Agricultural Research System / Johannes Roseboom, Philip G. Pardey, Helmke Sartorius von Bach, Johan van Zyl 45
- The structure of public agricultural research 45
- Public agricultural research personnel and funding 55
- Long-term developments 55
- Human resources 58
- Expenditure patterns 61
- Research focus 62
- Financing agricultural R&D 62
- Current policy concerns 66
- Econometric estimation 75
- The accounting approach: Total Factor Productivity indices 79
- The programming approach: Data Envelopment Analysis and the Malmquist Index 80
- 4 Measuring Total Factor Productivity Growth in South African Commercial Agriculture, 1947-91 / Colin Thirtle, Helmke Sartorius von Bach, Johan Van Zyl 83
- Theory 85
- From aggregate agricultural accounts to productivity measurement 88
- Results, index construction and interpretation 91
- 5 The Sources of Profitability: Relative Prices and Productivity / Johan van Zyl, Herman van Schalkwyk, Colin Thirtle 108
- Sources of profit change 109
- Productivity in South African agriculture, 1947-91 112
- Price recovery in South African agriculture, 1947-91 112
- Decomposition of profitability between price and productivity change 114
- 6 Farm Size and Efficiency in South African Commercial Agriculture / Johan van Zyl 117
- Economies of scale 117
- Structure of South African agriculture: issues related to size 120
- Economies of scale in commercial agriculture 123
- Total factor productivity by farm size category 126
- Explaining the results: policy, technology and management 129
- 7 Farm Size and Efficiency of Smallholder Agriculture / Jenifer Piesse, Helmke Sartorius von Bach, Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl 133
- Agriculture in three former homelands of the Northern Transvaal 135
- The data 136
- The measurement of productive efficiency 138
- Total, technical and scale efficiency: results and interpretation 140
- 8 The Effects of the 1992 Drought on Productivity in the Former Homelands: An Application of the Malmquist Index / Jenifer Piesse, David Hadley, Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl 149
- Comparing the normal and drought years 151
- Efficiency and technical progress: the Malmquist TFP index 154
- Results and interpretation 156
- Evaluating and assessing the impact of agricultural research[superscript 1] 164
- Time series analysis 174
- 9 Explaining Total Factor Productivity Growth: The Returns to Research and Extension in Commercial Agriculture / Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl 190
- Explaining TFP growth 191
- Calculating the returns to research and extension 194
- Short and long run returns to R&D 197
- 10 Cointegration and Modelling the Length and Shape of the Research Lag / Yougesh Khatri, Colin Thirtle 203
- Time series results 204
- Time series properties of the technology-related variables 204
- Tests of cointegration and Granger causality 205
- Lag relationships between research and productivity growth 209
- Returns to agricultural research and extension 215
- 11 The Effects of Policy and Technology: A Profit Function Approach / Yougesh Khatri, Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl 219
- The model 221
- Data 222
- Results 223
- 12 A Long-run Profit Function and a Review of the Returns to R&D / Carlos Arnade, Yougesh Khatri, David Schimmelpfennig, Colin Thirtle, Johan van Zyl 234
- Data and estimation of the long-run profit function 234
- Results 236
- 13 R&D and Crop Level Supply Response in Maize, Sorghum and Wheat / Robert Townsend, Colin Thirtle 246
- The supply response model 247
- The error correction model 249
- Estimation and results 250
- Lagged effects of R&D spending on output supply and rates of return to R&D 258
- 14 Induced Innovation, Policy and Technology: An Error Correction Model / Colin Thirtle, Robert Townsend, Johan van Zyl 264
- A direct test of the induced innovation hypothesis 265
- Time series analysis of the data 266
- Cointegration and error correction models 269
- 15 The Effects of Macroeconomic Policies on Agricultural Prices, Net Farm Incomes and Exports: A Vector Autoregression Approach / Robert Townsend, Colin Thirtle 276
- Macroeconomic variables and their impact on agriculture 277
- Data 284
- A systems approach to modelling macro-linkages 285
- 16 A New Vision for Agriculture in South Africa / Johan van Zyl, Colin Thirtle, Nick Vink 297
- New policy initiatives 298
- A vision for agriculture 302.
- Notes:
- Includes bibliographical references (pages 306-323) and index.
- Local Notes:
- Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the John Lammey Stewart Memorial Library Fund.
- ISBN:
- 0312235879
- OCLC:
- 44131809
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