The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effects of changes in the external trade environment and domestic economic policies on the agricultural development of Malaysia. The scope of this research also includes providing further insights into the strengths and weaknesses of the computable...

China's economy has undergone fundamental changes since 1978. Agriculture, industry and services are being transformed into market economies. Marketing and domestic trade have also been reformed to take into account regional comparative advantages. The government, however, still controls input...

The policy preference function (PPF) approach has become popular with economists seeking to explain the origin of government policies. In this paper, a distinction between positive and normative work with the PPF concept is made. Positive work is shown to suffer from a variety of shortcomings...

Both informal and formal loans matter in agriculture. However, formal lenders provide many more production loans than informal lenders, often at a cost (mostly loan default cost) higher than what they can recover. For example, the Agricultural Development Bank of Pakistan (ADBP), providing about...

Policymakers are increasingly calling upon agricultural research managers to consider poverty reduction objectives when making resource allocations. The authors present a simple method to measure the impact of agricultural research on the poor. This method has the advantage that it presents the...

This study examines the need for crop insurance for litchi production in northern Vietnam and how farmers might participate in such a program. Hypothetical insurance programs were developed which proposed all-risk coverage based on area yields. This coverage was offered to farmers to determine...

This survey provides a structured picture of 40 years of literature which uses welfare economic tools to judge agricultural policy. Challenges and developments of normative agricultural policy analysis are discussed in an easily accessible graphical framework. It is shown how the literature has...

The growth of market capitalism and the technological advances of the last two centuries underlie the relentless process of structural change in agriculture. Substantial occupational migration out of farming and geographical migration from rural to urban areas is a characteristic of most, if not...

Groundwater has the characteristics of commonly owned property, and its use is likely to be inefficient in the absence of regulation. Several management tools can be used to regulate groundwater withdrawals, with no one tool dominating the others in terms of efficiency of water use. However, the...