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Agricultural Systems and Their Determinants. Dr. George Norton Agricultural and Applied Economics Virginia Tech Copyright 2006. Objectives . Identify determinants of agricultural systems Explore various types of farming systems, including examples from China and India
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Agricultural Systems and Their Determinants Dr. George Norton Agricultural and Applied Economics Virginia Tech Copyright 2006
Objectives • Identify determinants of agricultural systems • Explore various types of farming systems, including examples from China and India • Consider factors that cause changes in farming systems over time
Factors affecting change in agricultural systems over time • Population growth • Changes in relative endowments of land and labor • New technologies • Changes in political systems
Chinese Agriculture • ½ the cropland of the United States • ¾ acre per Chinese farmworker compared to 120 acres in the United States • 800 million farmers in China compared to about 7 million in the United States • United States uses substantially more machinery
World Cereal Production • ≈ 2000 million metric tons currently • Will be ≈ 2700 million metric tons in 2020
Estimated net imports of Grain (China) a) Million Metric tons b) Pop Growth = 1.3% in 1990’s, 0.7% 2010-2020 Per capita income growth = 3% Ag. Research spending grows 3% annually
Types of Chinese farms • Communes – Major reforms began in 1979: Households within communes were assigned individual pieces of land. These individual pieces often organized into cooperatives. • State farms (very small percent of total) • Individual farms (significant share of the farms with land leased from the government). All farms except state farms now run under a “contract responsibility system”
Economies in transition: Effects on Farming systems • Why has China’s (much) slower political transition allowed agricultural productivity to increase more rapidly than the former Soviet Union’s more complete but rapid transition? • Property rights through contract responsibility system • Freeing up of markets and secure institutions
What institutions are necessary for agricultural growth to occur? • Property rights • Rule of law – ability to enforce contracts and rules to maintain market mechanism • Financial • Insurance
Conclusions • Farmers are rational and relatively efficient • Traditional farming systems are inevitably changing • Many technical and institutional factors are driving these changes • As systems such as those in China and India change, the effects spill over to the rest of the world