Agricultural Mechanization

Abstract

he mechanization of farming in developing countries has been T very uneven. In certain parts of Africa, in Java, and in many hilly regions, farmers still till their fields with hand tools even though animal tillage has been common in other parts of the world for thousands of years. While draft animals have completely disappeared in North America, Europe, and Japan, they have been widely accepted in Senegal only in the past few decades. Even in countries where farming is beginning to be mechanized, power tillers and tractors are still restricted to tillage and a few other operations. This paper discusses the history of mechanization, the major reasons for the wide diversity observed, the options for developing countries in extending mechanization, and the role of government policy in influencing the choice of technology. The emphasis is on the adoption of mechanized techniques in farming systems which are already using animal draft. The issues surrounding the introduction of animal draft where only hand cultivation is practiced are discussed in Pingali, Bigot, and Binswanger (1985). Instead of a summary or conclusions, a set of generalizations is presented in the text. The pattern and speed of mechanization is heavily influenced by rela-Economic tive scarcities of capital and labor, and other macroeconomic variables. Influences The responsiveness of invention and innovation to economywide factors has become known as the process of induced innovation (Hayami and Ruttan 1971; Binswanger and Ruttan 1978). Generalization 1. The rate and pattern of mechanization are governed substantially by an economy's land and labor endowments, by the nonagricultural demand for labor, and by demand for agricultural products.

The neglected governance challenges of agricultural mechanisation in Africa – insights from Ghana

“…Some banks allow the tractor to be financed with collateral (with a down payment of 30%) and register it under joint ownership 5,RE2] 27 [AMSEC1-9, TOW1-9, F1-9, IO1-3, 10-13, 8] 28 [10][11][12][13]8] 29 MD3,[5][6] until the credit is repaid. This goes beyond the Bstrong ownership^suggested by Binswanger (1986) that increases the ease of use of a Bmobile, fragile and indivisible^factor as collateral but requires enforceable property rights. The World Economic Forum (Schwab and Sala i Martin 2014) rates the property right enforcement in Ghana with 4.2 on a range from 1 (poorly defined/not protected) to 7 (well defined/protected).…”

“…Operating tractors at an economic scale might be difficult if farms are small and fragmented as past mechanisation efforts have shown (Binswanger 1986;Mrema et al 2008). Institutional solutions, such as tractor service markets and cooperatives, have helped smallholders to overcome these problems in countries that are now industrialised (see Olmstead and Rhode 1995, for the USA).…”

“…The causal chain starts with increasing timeliness of operations and includes overcoming seasonal labour shortages and cultivating not-yetutilised land (Ashburner and Kienzle 2011). At the same time, mechanisation can have negative externalities such as unemployment, landlessness, environmental problems and an unequal distribution of wealth (Binswanger 1986). (5) Bounded rationality and information asymmetry:…”

“…Rwanda where labour is abundant and land expansion is associated with high environmental costs (Jayne et al 2014a). As shown by Binswanger (1986), mechanisation can lead to an expansion of agricultural area, output and even employment if land is available and the demand for agricultural products is elastic. Agriculture in the United States in the nineteenth century is an example of such a situation.…”

Methodology for Measuring Distortions to Agricultural Incentives

“…Prominent users of that proportion -which can be less than half in lowincome countries even where there is little or no processing -include Bates (1981) and Binswanger and Scandizzo (1983). Users need to be aware, though, that this ratio understates the extent of farmer assistance (that is, it understates the rate of protection or overstates the rate of dis-protection to farmers), possibly by a large margin.…”