The paper begins by analysing the Brazilian economic development stressing the external sector of its economy. Brazil is already an important product player in food trade and could be, in the future, a very significant player in the international commerce of biofuel and bioproducts. For this...

A conservative ex-ante assessment of supply-shift gains alone (excluding social and environmental gains), shows that the investment in zero tillage (ZT) R&D by the Rice-Wheat Consortium and CIMMYT was highly beneficial with a benefit-cost ratio of 39, a net present value of US$ 94 million and an...

Deficits in physical infrastructure, problems with availability of agricultural inputs and poor access to agriculture-related information are the major constraints on the growth of agricultural productivity in India. The more rapid growth of mobile telephony as compared to fixed line telephony...

In this chapter, a summary of the evolution of major practices in rice production over the last 100 years in the country is presented. These practices essentially evolved out of the changes in the varieties introduced and planted by Filipino farmers, which have to change the manner by which...

Agricultural diversification as measured by increase in the percent of non-food crops has grown; whereas diversification as measured by the concentration indices has remained unchanged in the recent decade. There have been significant changes in the pattern of agricultural diversification at the...

The contemporary world is witnessing certain critical changes in the domain of grain utilization. With the ongoing efforts to substitute fossil fuels with bio-fuels, there has been a rise in the importance of fuel-use of cereals. This adds a new dimension to the food-feed competition that...

While there is a plethora of research documenting a multitude of dimensions of the crop sector of Pakistan, there is virtual absence of meaningful economic analysis of the dairy economy that is surprising. No serious attempt has been made in the past to clarify the micro-level potential of this...

Rice innovations are technologies and practices extensively adopted so as to change production practices and productivity. This paper documents the changes in rice productivity, policy and institutions in the last 100 years and identifies the technological change that may have affected rice...

This paper introduces rice to the reader and analyzes the changes it has gone through these past 100 years in the shaping hands of varietal improvement science. Here, the richness of the crop as a genetic material and resource is revealed. Landrace rice, pureline selection rice, crossbred rice,...

Sustaining and accelerating agricultural growth remains a development imperative in view of persistent rural poverty and emerging threats to food security. While growth can be achieved by expansion of agricultural area and input intensification, growth through improvement in productivity is a...