Prairie Crop Diversification

The Canadian prairies traditionally have been dominated by spring wheat production. Crop diversification is now being advocated to enhance farm-level risk management, ecological benefits, nutrient cycling, and pest and disease control, and to reduce the farm economy’s reliance on income from a single crop. There has always been interest in diversifying away from wheat, but until recently, economically feasible alternatives have been limited, and government policies may have constrained the shift to other crops. Knowing the impact of prices and policies on crop diversification is essential to understanding producer response and to determining strategies to enhance cropping diversity.Marketing,

INCOME DIVERSIFICATION AND POVERTY REDUCTION IN THE NORTHERN UPLANDS OF VIETNAM

In the context of the economic development, income diversification is sometimes defined as the process by which households switch from growing low-value staple food crops to growing a mix of food crops and higher-value commercial crops (crop diversification) and from farming to non-farm activities (non-farm diversification). The literature on income diversification has measured trends, identified determinants, and speculated on the constraints to diversification, but there has been relatively little analysis of the contribution of diversification to income growth. This paper uses household survey data from 1993 and 1998 to quantify the contribution of crop diversification and non-farm diversification to the growth of household income in the northern upland region of Vietnam. We find that rural incomes have increased substantially over this period, but non-farm income has increased at the same rate as farm income. Poor households are particularly dependent on crop income growth, while higher-income households rely more on non-farm diversification to increase their incomes. Crop diversification has made a non-negligible contribution to rising living standards in the northern uplands, but the contribution of yield growth is substantially greater. Crop income growth among poor households is based heavily on yield increases, while income growth among richer households is associated with area expansion and crop diversification. These results have implications for policies and investment to improve rural living standards.Food Security and Poverty,

Pattern of Agricultural Diversification in India

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 regional level. Within a region, smaller sub-regions or pockets of specialization in certain crops and crop-groups have emerged. Farms do not remain diversified and the usual notion of crop diversification as a risk management practice is also belied in the present study. The study also found certain kind of structural changes in all sub-sectors of agriculture : crop, livestock, and fisheries. Concerns over extreme effects of such changes are however, not valid.agricultural diversification, Agriculture Analysis, India, non-food crops, crop, livestock, and fisheries

Sources of agricultural growth in India: role of diversification towards high-value crops

"This study examines the sources of crop income growth in Indian agriculture over the 1980s and 1990s. Using a method developed by Minot (2003), the analysis decomposes crop income growth into the contribution of yield increases, area expansion, price increases, and diversification from low-value crops to higher-value crops. The results confirm that at the national level, technology (higher yield) was the main source of crop income growth during 1980s, while rising prices and diversification emerged as the dominant sources of growth in agriculture during 1990s. Diversification towards higher-value crops such as fruits and vegetables accounted for about 27% of crop income growth in the 1980s and 31% in the 1990s. However, these national averages hide substantial regional variation. In the grain-dominated northern and eastern regions, price increases were the most important source of growth during 1990s, while in the southern and western regions crop income growth was led by diversification into higher-value crops. The results reflect the slowing growth of wheat and rice yields in India, as well as the growing importance of diversification into higher-value crops. Restoring the growth in grain yields will require investment in agricultural research and development, while facilitating further diversification involves institutional development to better link small farmers with growing markets for high-value commodities. " Author's AbstractCrops, income growth, Agriculture, Grain production, Agricultural research, Research and development, High value commodities, Crop yields, Prices, High-value crops, Decomposition,

The inverse relationship between farm size and productivity in rural Rwanda

The Rwandan government has recently adopted new agricultural and land policies that strive to increase productivity in the agricultural sector though land consolidation and concentration, and through the promotion of regional crop specialisation and monocropping. This paper, however, identifies the strong inverse relationship between farm size and land productivity under the current land management system; also when taking into account farm fragmentation, crop diversification, frequency of multicropping and household size. In addition, it concludes that increased farm fragmentation, higher frequency of multicropping, and more crop diversification do not necessarily have a significant negative impact upon productivity, on the contrary. The paper reflects upon the implications of Rwanda’s agrarian and land policies

THE FARM DIVERSIFICATION DISCOUNT

This paper examines the effect of diversification on farm value by comparing values of diversified farms to a portfolio of comparable specialized farms. Using data from the Agricultural Resource Management Study, this study finds a diversification discount in agriculture similar to the discount found for corporate firms. The results show that diversified crop/livestock farms have a value loss of 5.8% in comparison with specialized crop or livestock farms for 1999-2001. Farms with commodity diversification have a value loss of 9.4% in comparison with commodity specialized farms. The results also show that the value loss due to diversification is larger for leveraged farms.Farm Management,

Pattern diversities in cropping systems in tribal regions: a case study of Jhabua tribal district in Madhya Pradesh, India

Agricultural development has been analysed by studying the cropping pattern and cropping diversification and crop specialization in any agro-ecosystem in regional and temporal framework. Tribal regions are experiencing agricultural intensification through diversification of cropping systems and crop specialization as a result of ecological economic changes as well as impact of public policy of technology transfer and resource use intensification. The market forces also are influencing the crop intensification as a result of exogenous market demand. In this paper, an attempt is made to analyze the pattern of cropping system in inter regional framework and identify how these patterns have changed over a period of time in Jhabua tribal district of Madhya Pradesh. Such an analysis will help in taking policy decisions for diversification and specialization of crop production in the changing cropping systems in regional framework with the objectives of achieving higher level of regional food production, maximisation of production and income to the farmers through promotion of cash crops etc. The analysis of the pattern diversity in regional framework would indicate to the eco-regional and exogenous impacts of market and public policies following the law of entropy.Cropping pattern, diversification, tribal regions

Does risk matter for farm businesses? The effect of crop insurance on production and diversification.

We use a large increase in Federal crop insurance subsidies as a natural experiment to identify the impact of risk on acreage and diversification decisions. Subsidy increases induced greater crop insurance coverage, which reduced farmers' financial risks. Did this change in the risk environment alter production decisions? We merged crop insurance participation data with farm-level Agricultural Census data from 1992 and 1997 to examine how harvested acreage and diversification changed in response to the policy-induced change in insurance coverage. The difference in differences empirical approach controls for unobservable heterogeneity and our results are robust across multiple definitions of our key variables and various fixed effects. We find that changes in the risk environment caused larger farms to expand while smaller farms shrank. Regardless of size, producers showed some evidence of using diversification as a method to mitigate risk. However, risk does not seem to have large overall effects.Risk and Uncertainty,

Do Farm Subsidies Affect Crop Diversification?

The United States spends $20 billion each year on farm subsidies. Farmers face increased risk and income variation when their crop portfolio is less diversified. It’s possible for farm subsidies to decrease diversification if they are focused on specific crops. Utilizing state level subsidy and agricultural data from the Environmental Working Group, I used econometric analysis to estimate the effect of farm subsidies on crop diversification. I used the number of acres planted from the 15 top most subsidized and grown crops in the United States to derive my dependent variable, the Herfindahl-Hirschman index (HHI). The HHI is a market concentration index; I used it as my measure of crop diversification. I tested to see if changes in subsidy values had an impact on the index. I found that crop specific subsidies had a statistically significant effect on diversification. Some crop subsidies increase overall crop diversification while others lead to less diversification. Research suggests that decreases in crop diversification has negative consequences for farmers and society in general

Identification and description of relationships between actors involved in crop diversification experiences across Europe

Agriculture can benefit from crop diversification to facilitate its transition to more sustainable agrifood systems. However, these practices remain rare in Europe. One major barrier is the existence of sociotechnical lock-ins. To clarify the dynamics at work, we analyzed the relationships between actors involved in 23 crop diversification experiences across 11 European countries. The novelty of this paper lies in the systemic analysis of the network of actors involved in crop diversification experiences. Using data from qualitative interviews and cognitive mapping approaches, we identify and describe the role of actors and the key relationships in crop diversification and detect relationships that are currently missing. Our study shows that in the different European countries, similar relationships act as levers or barriers to crop diversification, with farmers and researchers playing a crucial role. The most important cognitive factors that influence the choice of farmers to diversify are environmental and health concerns and the desire to make profit and innovate. We relate the cognitive factors to organizational, technical, economic, and political factors and suggest levers for crop diversification based on successful crop diversification experiences