Commercial farms in South Africa could become significantly more efficient if they became smaller. The government could encourage that trend by removing policies and distortions that favor large over small farms.Drawing on international evidence, van Zyl, Binswanger, and Thirtle discuss the sources of economies of scale.

Apparently factor prices do matter in agricultural production and in the selection of production technology. And in South Africa, more attention should be focused on the technological needs of small scale farmers.

This first progress report for the five-year Sida programme provides a comprehensive review of programme activities, progress towards outcomes, risks encountered and lessons learned in the first 18 months – from 1 October 2013 to 31 March 2015. It also discusses adjustments required to Year 2 implementation as a result of these findings.

To understand Thailand's policy on development and industrialization, one must also study its policy on trade and agriculture. Certain Thai policies have facilitated economic development in Thailand: Raising agricultural productivity even during the early period of import substitution. The relatively equal distribution of land. Decentralized industrial growth. The labor-intensive export orientation of both rural and urban industries. Generally open, merit-based access to education.

How can the process of tropical deforestation be controlled? We now know a good deal about the causes of deforestation but not its control. Research from the University of Leeds in Thailand and the Philippines fills this gap, showing that changes in the domestic political scene explain how deforestation processes have been controlled in the two countries. Environmental constraints and increases in agricultural productivity can curb the demand for farmland to some extent.

This paper examines the impact of recent changes in the relationship between landowners and tenants in Egypt.

Adaptation to climate change involves changes in agricultural management practices in response to changes in climate conditions. It often involves a combination of various individual responses at the farm-level and assumes that farmers have access to alternative practices and technologies available in the region.

Intensive farming has been adopted to produce large amounts of food grains and cash crops but environment is being deteriorated at alarming rate also. Increased use of fertilizers, pesticides, chemical growth regulators, machinery and poor management practices are accelerating environmental pollution, soil degradation, global warming, climatic change and food deterioration. Conservation agriculture offers a sustainable solution for all these problems most often. This review focuses the use of fertilizers in conservation agriculture and their impact on weed management.

Understanding land accumulation dynamics is relevant for policymakers interested in the economic effects of land inequality in developing country agriculture. This Working Paper explores and simultaneously tests the leading theories of microlevel land accumulation dynamics using unique panel data from Paraguay. The results suggest that farm growth varies systematically with farm size – a formal rejection of stochastic growth theories (that is, Gibrat's Law) – and that titled land area may have considerable infuence on land accumulation.

This report aims to improve the knowledge base for scaling-up investments in land management technologies that sequester soil carbon for increased productivity under changing climate conditions. The report presents the following key messages.

This paper investigates the impact of climate variability on maize yield in the Limpopo Basin of South Africa using the Generalized Maximum Entropy (GME) estimator and Maximum Entropy Leuven Estimator (MELE). Maize constitutes about 70 percent of grain production and covers about 60 percent of the cropping area in South Africa. It is a summer crop, mostly grown in semiarid regions of the country, and is highly susceptible to changes in precipitation and temperature.

This report details the proceedings of a workshop for indigenous livestock breeding communities that took place in Nairobi, Kenya, October 2003. The workshop sought to raise awareness among indigenous livestock keepers on their rights over animal genetic resources.The workshop showcased the significance of traditional knowledge and social systems for upholding farm animal genetic diversity.