An evolving paradigm of agricultural mechanization development: How much can Africa learn from Asia?

An evolving paradigm of agricultural mechanization development: How much can Africa learn from Asia? PDF Author: Diao, Xinshen, ed.
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN: 0896293807
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 548

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Book Description
Agricultural mechanization in Africa south of the Sahara — especially for small farms and businesses — requires a new paradigm to meet the needs of the continent’s evolving farming systems. Can Asia, with its recent success in adopting mechanization, offer a model for Africa? An Evolving Paradigm of Agricultural Mechanization Development analyzes the experiences of eight Asian and five African countries. The authors explore crucial government roles in boosting and supporting mechanization, from import policies to promotion policies to public good policies. Potential approaches presented to facilitating mechanization in Africa include prioritizing market-led hiring services, eliminating distortions, and developing appropriate technologies for the African context. The role of agricultural mechanization within overall agricultural and rural transformation strategies in Africa is also discussed. The book’s recommendations and insights should be useful to national policymakers and the development community, who can adapt this knowledge to local contexts and use it as a foundation for further research.

An evolving paradigm of agricultural mechanization development: How much can Africa learn from Asia?

An evolving paradigm of agricultural mechanization development: How much can Africa learn from Asia? PDF Author: Diao, Xinshen, ed.
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN: 0896293807
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 548

Get Book Here

Book Description
Agricultural mechanization in Africa south of the Sahara — especially for small farms and businesses — requires a new paradigm to meet the needs of the continent’s evolving farming systems. Can Asia, with its recent success in adopting mechanization, offer a model for Africa? An Evolving Paradigm of Agricultural Mechanization Development analyzes the experiences of eight Asian and five African countries. The authors explore crucial government roles in boosting and supporting mechanization, from import policies to promotion policies to public good policies. Potential approaches presented to facilitating mechanization in Africa include prioritizing market-led hiring services, eliminating distortions, and developing appropriate technologies for the African context. The role of agricultural mechanization within overall agricultural and rural transformation strategies in Africa is also discussed. The book’s recommendations and insights should be useful to national policymakers and the development community, who can adapt this knowledge to local contexts and use it as a foundation for further research.

Development of agricultural mechanization in Ghana

Development of agricultural mechanization in Ghana PDF Author: Cossar, Frances
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 17

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Book Description
This paper characterizes the network of tractor service providers in Ghana. Using the case of Ejura-Sekye-dumase district, this research examines the implications of the adoption of mechanical technology in agriculture for farmers and institutions based on perspectives that go beyond the suppliers and users of mechanization ser-vices alone. The results suggest that, in addition to rising population density and favorable access to local and regional markets, the current pattern of use of tractors by farmers in Ejura district emerged from favorable histori-cal and institutional factors. The current arrangement involving a network of private tractor owners providing trac-tor hire services to a broad set of farmers draws upon the legacy of an earlier institutional intervention and is sus-tained organizationally through kinship and other existing social relationships within and outside the district. More-over, the expansion of tractor use has created a set of new roles and relationships within the network. Participa-tion in the network is affected by various factors, including farmer’s access to capital and knowledge, experience, and contacts. This privately operated network is significantly more efficient and provides small-scale farmers with considerably better access to plowing service than did previous government-managed systems. Further develop-ment of the tractor service sector is likely to improve the quality of mechanization offered to smallholder farmers, enhance bargaining power for farmers seeking such services, and reduce structural weaknesses within the net-work.

Sustainable Agricultural Mechanization: A Framework for Africa

Sustainable Agricultural Mechanization: A Framework for Africa PDF Author: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations
Publisher: Food & Agriculture Org.
ISBN: 9251308713
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 150

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Book Description
This framework presents ten interrelated principles/elements to guide Sustainable Agricultural Mechanization in Africa (SAMA). Further, it presents the technical issues to be considered under SAMA and the options to be analysed at the country and sub regional levels. The ten key elements required in a framework for SAMA are as follows: The analysis in the framework calls for a specific approach, involving learning from other parts of the world where significant transformation of the agricultural mechanization sector has already occurred within a three-to-four decade time frame, and developing policies and programmes to realize Africa’s aspirations of Zero Hunger by 2025. This approach entails the identification and prioritization of relevant and interrelated elements to help countries develop strategies and practical development plans that create synergies in line with their agricultural transformation plans. Given the unique characteristics of each country and the diverse needs of Africa due to the ecological heterogeneity and the wide range of farm sizes, the framework avoids being prescriptive.

Agricultural Mechanization in Sub-Saharan Africa

Agricultural Mechanization in Sub-Saharan Africa PDF Author: Karim Houmy
Publisher: Food & Agriculture Organization of the UN (FAO)
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 112

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Book Description
The manual work carried out by farmers and their families is often both arduous and time consuming and in many countries this is a major constraint to increasing agricultural production. Such day-to-day drudgery is a major contributoring factor in the migration of people, particularly the young, from the rural countryside to seek the prospect of a better life in the towns and cities. Farm production can be substantially increased through the use of mechanical technologies which both are labor-saving and directly increase yields and production. This document provides guidelines on the development and formulation of an agricultural mechanization strategy and forms part of FAO's approach on sustainable production intensification.

Agricultural Mechanization in Ghana

Agricultural Mechanization in Ghana PDF Author: Nazaire Houssou
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 24

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Book Description
Since 2007, the government of Ghana has been providing subsidized agricultural machines to private enterprises established as Agricultural Mechanization Services Enterprise Centers (AMSEC) to scale up tractor-hire services to smallholder farmers. Although farmer’s demand for mechanization has increased in recent years, most of this demand concentrates on land preparation (plowing) service. Using the firm investment model and recent data, this paper quantitatively assesses whether AMSEC as a private enterprise is a viable business model attractive to private investors. Even though the intention of the government is to promote private sector-led mechanization, findings suggest that the AMSEC model is unlikely to be a profitable business model attractive to private investors even with the current level of subsidy. The low tractor utilization rate as a result of low operational scale is the most important constraint to the intertemporal profitability of tractor-hire services. Our findings further support the argument of Pingali, Bigot, and Binswanger (1987), who indicated that mechanization service centers supported through government’s heavy subsidy are not a policy option anywhere in the world, even in the current situation in Ghana. Although the tractor rental service market is a proper way of mechanizing agriculture in a smallholder-dominated agricultural economy such as Ghana, this paper concludes that the development of such a market depends crucially on a number of factors, including increased tractor use through migration across the two very different rainfall zones (north and south), increased tractor use through multiple tasks, and use of low-cost tractors. The government can play an important role in facilitating the development of a tractor service market; however, the successful development of such a market depends on the incentive and innovation of the private sector, including farmers who want to own tractors as part of their business portfolio, traders who know how to bring in affordable tractors and expand the market, and manufacturers in exporting countries who want to seek a long-term potential market opportunity in Ghana and in other west African countries.

Effects of agricultural mechanization on economies of scope in crop production in Nigeria

Effects of agricultural mechanization on economies of scope in crop production in Nigeria PDF Author: Takeshima, Hiroyuki
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 34

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Book Description
Agricultural mechanization has often been characterized by scale-effects and increased specialization. Such characterizations, however, fail to explain how mechanization may grow in Africa where production environments are more heterogeneous and diversification of production may help in mitigating risks from increasingly uncertain climatic conditions. Using panel data from farm households and crop-specific production costs in Nigeria, we estimate how the adoption of animal traction or tractors affects the economies of scope (EOS) between rice, non-rice grains, legume/seed crops, and other crops, which are the crop groups that are most widely grown with animal traction or tractors in Nigeria. The results indicate that the adoption of these mechanization technologies is associated with lower EOS between non-rice grains, legume/seed crops, and other crops, but greater EOS between rice and other crops. An increase in EOS for rice is indicated in both primal and dual analytical approaches. Mechanical technologies may raise EOS between crops that are grown in more heterogeneous environments, even though it may lower EOS between crops that are grown in relatively similar environments. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first paper that shows the effects of mechanical technologies on EOS in agriculture in developing countries.

Farm Power and Mechanization for Small Farms in Sub-Saharan Africa

Farm Power and Mechanization for Small Farms in Sub-Saharan Africa PDF Author: B. G. Sims
Publisher: FAO
ISBN:
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 98

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Book Description
Many previous publications on farm mechanization, draught animal power, hand tool technology, etc. have tended to be narrowly focused. The topic of farm power and mechanization also tended to be separated from the actual process of growing crops. This manual looks at putting the different sources of farm power, mechanization, machines, equipment and tools in a much broader context. Farm power requirements need to be viewed with reference to rural livelihoods and to farming systems as well as to the critical area of labour saving in HIV/AIDS-hit populations. No one particular type of technology is advocated.

Farming Systems and Poverty

Farming Systems and Poverty PDF Author: John A. Dixon
Publisher: Food & Agriculture Org.
ISBN: 9789251046272
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
A joint FAO and World Bank study which shows how the farming systems approach can be used to identify priorities for the reduction of hunger and poverty in the main farming systems of the six major developing regions of the world.

The Conditions of Agricultural Growth

The Conditions of Agricultural Growth PDF Author: Ester Boserup
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134162146
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 125

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Book Description
When it first appeared in 1965, The Conditions of Agricultural Growth heralded a breakthrough in the theory of agricultural development. Whereas 'development' had previously been seen as the transformation of traditional communities by the introduction (or imposition) of new technologies, Ester Boserup argued that changes and improvements occur from within agricultural communities, and that improvements are governed not only by outside interference, but by those communities themselves. Using extensive analyses of the costs and productivity of the main systems of traditional agriculture, Ester Boserup concludes that technical, economic and social changes are unlikely to take place unless the community concerned is exposed to the pressure of population growth. In sharp contrast to widely accepted ideas, she shows how population growth may be the main stimulus to agrarian change. In developing this theme, the author identifies successive stages of agriculture, characterized by differences in techniques of cultivation and in social structure and show how they can be explained by differences in population density. This book is of relevance not only to economists, but also to historians interested in the way present changes in agrarian communities parallel those of the past.

Medium and large-scale farmers and agricultural mechanization in Ghana

Medium and large-scale farmers and agricultural mechanization in Ghana PDF Author: Chapoto, Antony
Publisher: Intl Food Policy Res Inst
ISBN:
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 49

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Book Description
The survey was aimed at characterizing the transition of smallholder farmers who have become medium- and large-scale commercial farmers in Ghana, assessing agricultural machinery ownership, and patterns of demand for agricultural mechanization among farmers in the country. The data generated from the survey will answer some of the critical questions pertaining to agricultural transformation in the country.