- Email: [email protected]
The agro-technological system towards 2000
192
REVIEWS
REFERENCES DASGUFTA,P. S. and HEAL, G. M. (1979). Economic Theory and Exhaustible Resources. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. FISHER, A. C. (1981). Resource and Environmental Economics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. KRELLE, W. (1984). ‘Economic Growth with Exhaustible Resources and Environmental Protection’, Journal of Theoretical and Institutional Economics,
140, 399-429.
MARX, K. (1954). Capital, Vol. 1. Lawrence & Wishart, London. RANDALL, A. (1987). Resource Economics : An Economic Approach to Natural Resource and Environmental Policy, 2nd edn. Wiley, New York. SIEBERT,H. (1987). Economics of the Environment: Theory and Policy, 2nd edn. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. SRAFFA, P. (1960). Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
The Agro-Technological System Towards 2000. Edited by GILBERTO ANTONELLI and ALBERTO QUADRIO-CURZIO (Amsterdam: North Holland, 1988. Pp. 298. DA. 175 hardback. ISBN o-444-704612). In September 1986 a meeting organized by the Banca Nazionale de1 Lavoro, one of the largest banks in Italy, and Nomisma, Laboratory of Industrial Economy, was held in Bologna. Participants belonged to the world of research, teaching, administration, and to industrial and financial enterprises from Italy, other European countries and the US. The communications presented at this meeting are gathered in the present book which forms a comprehensive account of technical advances, and of present and forthcoming changes in agricultural production throughout the world. This book is divided into three parts preceded by an introduction written by the editors, A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli, who present the theoretical and empirical frameworks relating all the contributions and try to make a synthesis of the most important aspects of relevant economic policy. Other communications delivered during the meeting and not published in this book are also discussed by A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli. Part 1, presented by G. T. Scarascia Mugnozza, includes three chapters in which the trends of world agricultural production are surveyed. After an historical analysis of the relationships between agriculture and industry during the 19th century by I. Adelman and C. Morris, two chapters written, respectively, by A. Ray and D. Bergmann focus on market policies that can compensate for distortions caused by a too interventionist policy of the state. According to these authors, the apparent incompatibility between a policy of technical modernization of the production structure and the piling up of stocks can only be solved by a more liberal agricultural policy. Moreover, this book provides an interesting comparison between developed and developing countries with a rather unusual agreement of points of views for this type of approach. It is also suggested that, in developed countries, agricultural policy takes more into account problems pertaining to soil preservation, improvement of the quality of food products, and pollution control. Part 2, introduced by E. R. Grilli, is divided into four chapters devoted to the problem of agricultural surplus resulting from bad adjustment policies. G. Johnson is mainly concerned with relationships between constraints of price adjustments, and the structural, institutional and financial inflexibilities. The chapter by G. Galizzi deals with quantitative constraints of adjustment taking into account technical innovations. The chapter by A. Valdez, which is particularly interesting, analyses the variation in constraints relative to international trade, and especially the exchanges between industrialized and developing countries. He demonstrates how a more liberal trade pattern in the North is essential to Southern countries and why developing countries should be involved in worldwide trade negotiations. By contrast, R. Evenson deals with the effect of technology transfer to
REVIEWS
193
al production. After a description of four types of technology transfer (direct, c ~‘I-~~~ science, and capacity), he points out the reduced number of Zaptati%l,:, pre-technological direct technology transfers, the larger frequency of adapted transfer, and the predominance of scientific pre-technological transfers with a special emphasis on the American capacity for research. includes communications favourable to the Part 3, introduced by A. M. Costa, implementation of a rational agricultural policy. J. Mellor considers that agriculture has to be treated as other fields of production, and that it has to cope with a process of restructuring similar to the one that is taking place in other activities. This concerns developed as well as developing countries. F. Sanderson discusses in detail the long-term trends of the world demand for agricultural products. U. Bertele gives information on the size of production units in the food industry. He shows figures relative to how the process of internationalization of food production has developed in the last few years in spite of some protectionism, of monetary distortions and of other difficulties. The chapter by D. Schliephake gives a technical analysis of the relationships within the agro-chemicopharmaceutical channel. He shows how industrial transformation of agricultural raw materials will change as a result of technical advances. He gives some interesting information relative to starch and glucose derivatives. Finally, the chapter by D. Hall and J. Combs deals with the agro-energy channel and its future. In spite of the variety of themes and approaches, this volume appears as a coherent whole and gives to the reader a good synthesis as well as a survey of problems encountered by the agricultural sector in coping with technical advances. Unfortunately, most of the works concern plant production. The future of animal production, particularly meat and dairy products, is treated only in a few chapters. Moreover, consumers, who are the target of food production, are not fully considered, as they are only mentioned in general categories relative to the ‘variation in world demand’. At present, some research work is analysing more thoroughly consumers’ behaviour, which, according to some authors, has an important role to play as far as the restructuring of agricultural production is concerned. Since the Bologna meeting, at which these papers were presented, it has been observed that, in spite of a very active presence of public authorities in Europe, the European stocks have decreased. This would have been a valuable information to deal with in the chapters by D. Bergmann, A. Ray, and G. Johnson. The quality of contributing papers, the good knowledge of the topics treated, the quantity and variety of data collected, which does not prevent the general consistency of the work, make the book of interest to a wide audience. All readers, according to their own concern, will find valuable information in the various chapters. As far as the present reviewer is concerned, the chapters by A. Valdez, R. Evenson, U. Bertele, and D. Schliephake appear to be particularly valuable. There is an interesting preface by R. Prodi and an equally interesting introduction by A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli, which discuss the general problem of technical change and of its relationships with agriculture within the complex framework of market and structural constraints. AA
RACL H. GREEN INRA,
Paris
REVIEWS
REFERENCES DASGUFTA,P. S. and HEAL, G. M. (1979). Economic Theory and Exhaustible Resources. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. FISHER, A. C. (1981). Resource and Environmental Economics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. KRELLE, W. (1984). ‘Economic Growth with Exhaustible Resources and Environmental Protection’, Journal of Theoretical and Institutional Economics,
140, 399-429.
MARX, K. (1954). Capital, Vol. 1. Lawrence & Wishart, London. RANDALL, A. (1987). Resource Economics : An Economic Approach to Natural Resource and Environmental Policy, 2nd edn. Wiley, New York. SIEBERT,H. (1987). Economics of the Environment: Theory and Policy, 2nd edn. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. SRAFFA, P. (1960). Production of Commodities by Means of Commodities. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
The Agro-Technological System Towards 2000. Edited by GILBERTO ANTONELLI and ALBERTO QUADRIO-CURZIO (Amsterdam: North Holland, 1988. Pp. 298. DA. 175 hardback. ISBN o-444-704612). In September 1986 a meeting organized by the Banca Nazionale de1 Lavoro, one of the largest banks in Italy, and Nomisma, Laboratory of Industrial Economy, was held in Bologna. Participants belonged to the world of research, teaching, administration, and to industrial and financial enterprises from Italy, other European countries and the US. The communications presented at this meeting are gathered in the present book which forms a comprehensive account of technical advances, and of present and forthcoming changes in agricultural production throughout the world. This book is divided into three parts preceded by an introduction written by the editors, A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli, who present the theoretical and empirical frameworks relating all the contributions and try to make a synthesis of the most important aspects of relevant economic policy. Other communications delivered during the meeting and not published in this book are also discussed by A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli. Part 1, presented by G. T. Scarascia Mugnozza, includes three chapters in which the trends of world agricultural production are surveyed. After an historical analysis of the relationships between agriculture and industry during the 19th century by I. Adelman and C. Morris, two chapters written, respectively, by A. Ray and D. Bergmann focus on market policies that can compensate for distortions caused by a too interventionist policy of the state. According to these authors, the apparent incompatibility between a policy of technical modernization of the production structure and the piling up of stocks can only be solved by a more liberal agricultural policy. Moreover, this book provides an interesting comparison between developed and developing countries with a rather unusual agreement of points of views for this type of approach. It is also suggested that, in developed countries, agricultural policy takes more into account problems pertaining to soil preservation, improvement of the quality of food products, and pollution control. Part 2, introduced by E. R. Grilli, is divided into four chapters devoted to the problem of agricultural surplus resulting from bad adjustment policies. G. Johnson is mainly concerned with relationships between constraints of price adjustments, and the structural, institutional and financial inflexibilities. The chapter by G. Galizzi deals with quantitative constraints of adjustment taking into account technical innovations. The chapter by A. Valdez, which is particularly interesting, analyses the variation in constraints relative to international trade, and especially the exchanges between industrialized and developing countries. He demonstrates how a more liberal trade pattern in the North is essential to Southern countries and why developing countries should be involved in worldwide trade negotiations. By contrast, R. Evenson deals with the effect of technology transfer to
REVIEWS
193
al production. After a description of four types of technology transfer (direct, c ~‘I-~~~ science, and capacity), he points out the reduced number of Zaptati%l,:, pre-technological direct technology transfers, the larger frequency of adapted transfer, and the predominance of scientific pre-technological transfers with a special emphasis on the American capacity for research. includes communications favourable to the Part 3, introduced by A. M. Costa, implementation of a rational agricultural policy. J. Mellor considers that agriculture has to be treated as other fields of production, and that it has to cope with a process of restructuring similar to the one that is taking place in other activities. This concerns developed as well as developing countries. F. Sanderson discusses in detail the long-term trends of the world demand for agricultural products. U. Bertele gives information on the size of production units in the food industry. He shows figures relative to how the process of internationalization of food production has developed in the last few years in spite of some protectionism, of monetary distortions and of other difficulties. The chapter by D. Schliephake gives a technical analysis of the relationships within the agro-chemicopharmaceutical channel. He shows how industrial transformation of agricultural raw materials will change as a result of technical advances. He gives some interesting information relative to starch and glucose derivatives. Finally, the chapter by D. Hall and J. Combs deals with the agro-energy channel and its future. In spite of the variety of themes and approaches, this volume appears as a coherent whole and gives to the reader a good synthesis as well as a survey of problems encountered by the agricultural sector in coping with technical advances. Unfortunately, most of the works concern plant production. The future of animal production, particularly meat and dairy products, is treated only in a few chapters. Moreover, consumers, who are the target of food production, are not fully considered, as they are only mentioned in general categories relative to the ‘variation in world demand’. At present, some research work is analysing more thoroughly consumers’ behaviour, which, according to some authors, has an important role to play as far as the restructuring of agricultural production is concerned. Since the Bologna meeting, at which these papers were presented, it has been observed that, in spite of a very active presence of public authorities in Europe, the European stocks have decreased. This would have been a valuable information to deal with in the chapters by D. Bergmann, A. Ray, and G. Johnson. The quality of contributing papers, the good knowledge of the topics treated, the quantity and variety of data collected, which does not prevent the general consistency of the work, make the book of interest to a wide audience. All readers, according to their own concern, will find valuable information in the various chapters. As far as the present reviewer is concerned, the chapters by A. Valdez, R. Evenson, U. Bertele, and D. Schliephake appear to be particularly valuable. There is an interesting preface by R. Prodi and an equally interesting introduction by A. Quadrio-Curzio and G. Antonelli, which discuss the general problem of technical change and of its relationships with agriculture within the complex framework of market and structural constraints. AA
RACL H. GREEN INRA,
Paris