Showing papers on "Subsistence agriculture published in 1975"

The Niche Concept: Suggestions for Its Use in Human Ecology

Abstract: The Hutchinsonian concept of the ecological niche can be made operational for studies in human ecology by defining it in terms of thedistinctive ways of using resources for subsistence that set “cultural species” apart. Subsistence variety, the number of resources used for subsistence, and how much each is depended on are measures of distinctiveness, and the amount of variety present can be defined as thewidth of the ecological niche. The calculation of niche width from subsistence data is discussed, and examples are given from several human groups with reference to total resource variety, resource variety in space, and resource variety in time. The importance of selecting niche dimensions for niche width measurement is stressed, and examples are given of width differences resulting from measuring variety in quantity (biomass or calories) and variety in quality (protein, essential minerals, etc.). Finally, some implications of niche width measurements for human ecology are discussed.

Effects of Green Revolution strategies on tenants and small-scale landowners in the Chilalo region of Ethiopia

Abstract: Ethiopia is one of the least developed countries in the world, yet it has a natural endowment of adequate land mass, generally fertile soils, sufficient rainfall, and a considerable variety of climates and elevations.' This natural resource base and the existence of a large, hardworking peasantry indicate that Ethiopia has enormous agrarian potential, but unfortunately a potential far from realization. More than 85 percent of the 25 million Ethiopian people earn their livelihood from subsistence agriculture. Total agricultural output is 55-60 percent of gross domestic product (one of the highest such figures in the world), and the nonmonetary sector is probably 75 percent of this total. The monetary sector of agrieulture accounts for more than 90 percent of exports, with some 60 percent of this figure depending on coffee. Finally, the annual growth rate in agriculture during the last decade averaged about 2.4 percent, which is probably less than the overall population growth during the same period. As a result, Ethiopia has one of the lowest per capita income levels in the world.

The Political Economy of Rural Development in Latin America: An Interpretation

Abstract: The theory of unequal exchange between center and periphery is extended to provide an interpretation of rural underdevelopment in Latin America. It serves to explain both the causality of agricultural stagnation under dominance of the latifundio and the economic functionality of the subsistence sector where rural poverty is concentrated. The contradictions of the subsistence sector as a purveyor of cheap labor to the commercial sector of the economy imply population growth and ecological destruction that reinforce rural misery. This theory provides a framework to analyze the political economy of rural development programs. Land reform and small farmer rural development projects are discussed in this context.

A re-examination of the cross-cultural principles of task segregation and sex role differentiation in the family

Abstract: This study reexamined Parsons' and Bales' proposition that a universal feature of the social structure of the family is sex role specialization of tasks. Applying a newly developed data base (Murdock's Ethnographic Atlas) this research investigated the degree to which males, to the exclusion of females, assumed the role of task specialist in the subsistence economy. In 862 societies, examined over 5 critical subsistence variables, analyses revealed that women contribute appreciably to their respective subsistence economies. Over all societies women contributed an average of 44% of subsistence production, thus providing no support for this assumed universal characteristic of the family. A n important theme recapitulated throughout much of the literature concerned with the analysis of social institutions has been the attempt to delineate universal patterns of interdependence within the family. As in many other areas of scientific concern, the initial impetus for such study was provided by the need to develop common definitional features which would enable the identification and differentiation of the family, as a social unit, from other institutional subsystems. A larger theoretical purpose motivated such attempts as well, for by their very nature the presence of universal patterns of interdependence within the family would foster the generation of important postulates concerning the process of interaction between persons and between individuals and the larger social unit. Unfortunately, while the data necessary for the resolution of this issue were far from satisfactory, its theoretical importance was such that premature speculation concerning the existence of certain universals was sometimes accepted as established fact. It is a major aim of this report to reexamine some of these proposals in light of a newly available, comprehensive data set in order to determine with greater certainty the validity of these previous conceptualizations.

Marketable Surplus Functions for a Subsistence Crop: Rice in the Philippines

Abstract: Despite its critical importance in the design of agricultural price policy in developing countries, the price response of marketable surplus for a subsistence crop has remained a major unsettled issue. Ample evidence is available that subsistence farmers adjust their production in response to price changes (Krishna 1967). However, few empirical estimates exist on the price response of farm households in allocating the produced output between home consumption and market sale, although there have been a number of indirect inferences (Behrman; Krishna 1962, 1965; Krishnan; Mangahas, Recto, and Ruttan; Mubyarto). Moreover, limited attempts to estimate the price response directly have yielded mutually conflicting results (Bardhan; Bardhan and Bardhan; Haessel). Difficulty in the empirical estimation of the price response of the marketable surplus and home consumption for a given output following harvest stems simply from the unavailability of adequate data which relate marketable surplus and/or home consumption to price. In this study we attempt to fill this critical gap by estimating the price responses for both the marketable surplus and that portion retained for home consumption using sample survey results for three consecutive years.

Farmer's Wife, Weaver's Wife: Women and Work in two Southern Ethiopian Communities

Abstract: It has by now been amply demonstrated that involvement of a local region with the world capitalist economy, or "development," can have disastrous effects upon the economic status of women (Boserup, 1970). These changes are created by the involvement of the labor force in activities related to world markets in commodities, either by working as wage laborers on plantations, mines, and factories, or by cultivating cash crops as tenants or owners of land. In Africa women have been barred from much of the wage labor available, yet have been expected to subsidize low wages paid to men of their families by agricultural work and trading (Hay, 1976; Stichter, n.d.). Where new agricultural techniques have been introduced, men have been trained to use them despite the preponderance of female farmers in much of African traditional agriculture (Boserup, 1970: 53-65). I had the privilege in 1969-1971 of working as an anthropologist in Ethiopia, a nation at that time marginal to the world economy. Principal exports were cotton and coffee, both unsuitable for cultivation in much of the Ethiopian highland. Indigenous manufacturing firms employed fewer than 50,000 people in a population estimated at 25 million (Ethiopia Statistical Abstract, 1970: 54). The nation had never been part of a real colonial empire; Italian domination in 1938-41 was too brief to set up successful forms of foreign-dominated economic extraction. Various types of subsistence farming and pastoralism supported the bulk of the Ethiopian population. This paper presents a comparison of women's economic positions in two ethnically similar and economically different communities.1 These communities are located ten miles apart in the Gamu Highland of Southern Ethiopia. One of the communities studied, Dita, engaged both men and women in farming. Only a fraction of their produce was sold, and little of this reached markets outside the area. In Dorze, the men were primarily weavers. They often migrated to Ethiopia's urban centers, especially Addis Ababa, to eliminate some of the middlemen's profits in the cloth trade. While some of the women migrated with their husbands, most remained at home. There they engaged in agriculture, childcare, housekeeping, production for sale in local markets, and trading. Much Dorze agricultural land lay fallow, and food was imported from adjacent farming areas in both highlands and lowlands. The comparison made here, therefore, is between women's work in a peasant farming context with high "economic autarky of the family group" (Boserup, 1970: 15) and women's work in a community involved in the embryonic commercial sector of the Ethiopian economy. The farming area was not articulated with international commodity markets through cash cropping, and the weaving area's relationship to the world economy was indirect. Weavers used imported cotton yarns, and sold their product for cash. The monetization of the Ethiopian economy and the level of demand for consumer goods were in part affected by the sale of Ethiopian coffee and cotton abroad. Lacking strong connections with the world capitalist economy, to what extent do the economies of the farming and weaving areas exhibit economic equality between men and women? Has this equality been increased or diminished by the involvement of the Dorze community in male migration and male production for exchange value? These questions will

Elasticity of the Marketable Surplus of a Subsistence Crop at Various Stages of Development

Abstract: The price elasticity of the marketable surplus of food crops grown partly for home consumption in traditional agriculture is one of the central concepts in debate about the economies of developing countries. There has been considerable difference of opinion about both the sign and magnitude of this elasticity.' It is generally hypothesized that the marketable surplus of a subsistence crop tends to behave in a perverse way to changes in market prices. The surplus varies inversely with market price, even though the price elasticity of total output of the crop concerned may be positive. Two explanations have been suggested as justifications for this perverse behavior. One asserts that farmers in traditional agriculture have relatively fixed demand for money and, therefore, only sell as much of their produce as is necessary to obtain the desired amount of money income. The marketable surplus of a subsistence crop may, thus, be inversely related to market price.2 The second explanation argues that an increased market price for a subsistence crop may increase the producer's income sufficiently so that the income effect on his demand for consumption of the crop outweighs the substitution effect in production and consumption; the marketable surplus may, therefore, vary inversely with market price.3 The policy implications of this issue are important. The effect of price on the marketable surplus of food crops grown partly for home consumption is a matter of central importance for a growing economy; the rate of growth of the urban industrial sector depends on the availability of food

Subsistence Trends in a Modern Eskimo Community

Abstract: While Eskimos of Nunivak Island, Alaska, still engage in traditional subsistence activities, they require an adequate cash income in order to acquire and maintain the equipment needed for such activities. In this paper traditional subsistence modes are examined as well as the economic opportunities that permit the Nunivagamiut to maintain them. The use of imported food in part reflects the degree to which a family is unable to participate in its traditional culture. It is indicated that at least part of this inability is of an economic nature.

Effects and Interactions of ‘Package Deal’ Inputs on Yield and Labour Demand of Maize

Abstract: Effects of sowing dates, population, fertilizer, weeding and variety inputs on yield were measured, as well as labour required to apply the inputs. Sowing date was the most important, response to others being dependent upon this factor. Population was least important, but increased in value as fertilizer level was raised. Labour requirements were so increased by applying the ‘package’ that subsistence farmers, whose families are fully occupied as the sole source of labour, would be unable to cope without reducing the area under cultivation. Thus yield response to a package must be higher than hitherto considered acceptable, and the risk of not obtaining this increase probably contributes to the rejection of such recommendations by subsistence farmers.

Subsistence activities in the national accounts of developing countries with special reference to latin america

Abstract: This paper presents some preliminary findings from a research study by the OECD Development Centre into the treatment of subsistence activities in national accounts. It summarizes the results of a questionnaire on country practices, and reports on the findings with respect to shares of non-monetary production in GDP, methods of estimation, and usefulness of the resulting estimates. Among the 48 developing countries covered, the share of non-monetary value added in total GDP ranges from over 40 percent for the poorer countries of Africa to 5 percent or less for the more advanced countries of Latin America and Southern Europe. In countries where rural living standards are much below those in urban areas, non-monetary activities may be very important to the well-being of a large number of people, even though they form only a small part of GDP, and it is still important to make realistic estimates for subsistence output. Agriculture is obviously the main item in non-monetary production, accounting often for over 80 percent of the total. Most countries use some kind of “producers' prices” for valuing agricultural output. Few countries now publish separate figures for non—monetary activities. For many countries, doing so would involve a considerable amount of extra work, but for a number of planning purposes it does seem important to distinguish subsistence activities separately.

Small farm improvement strategies‐the implications of a computer simulation study of indigenous farming in South East Ghana

Abstract: This paper outlines the methodology and findings of a village level farm management study in South‐east Ghana. A linear programming model is used to investigate the production response of farmers to the introduction of mechanisation, crop technology and credit innovations. The results are presented and their research, extension and policy implications are discussed. It is considered that the results support the argument for undertaking detailed farm level studies in order to understand the nature of existing farming systems as a basis for assessing the possibilities for their improvement. The results also suggest that the present states of technical knowledge and research orientation are biased in favour of the better‐off farmers and, as such, do not provide a suitable basis for recommendations consistent with equality, which governments profess to be their objective.

The Subsistence Base of Middle Han Sites of the Chulmun Period

Abstract: F sites with Chulmuntogi-"comb-pattern pottery"-on the coasts, islands, and major· rivers of Korea, early archaeologists quite reasonably concluded that the associated subsistence base must have been aquatic resources. Figure 1 shows the location of the Chulmun sites, which clearly cluster in riverine and coastal groupings. Most of the coastal and island sites are shell mounds, and river sites contain numerous net sinkers, adding further weight to the locational inference. However, closer inspection of a group of related sites on the Han River in central Korea suggests a different pattern of subsistence activities in this location.

Development Strategies in Dual Economies: A Kenyan Example

Abstract: Many developing countries share the difficult problem of attempting to provide aid to the large sectors of their population living at or near a minimal subsistence level. These subsistence sectors are often characterized by their traditional orientation and their relative isolation from the commercial or modern sectors of the developing nation's economy. This isolation does not always entail physical remoteness of traditional enclaves, although spatial imbalances and disparities are frequent concomitants of functional dislocation within the economy. The maintenance of separate institutions governing social and economic relationships, and the persistence of patterns of motivation and behavior at variance with modern modes of reasoning, are frequently sufficient to impede contact between closely contiguous groups of traditional and commercially oriented peoples. Thus although development may be theoretically possible for any group, and is often conceptualized as a continuum between low and high states of productivity and welfare, in some countries a pronounced dichotomy arises between traditional and modern groups. Economies in which functional separation of subsistence and commercial sectors has become acute are referred to as dual economies.

Days beyond recall: subsistence homesteading in the rural south, circa 1920.

Abstract: Accented in some 100 semi-structured interviews with Southern aged poor is the bitter struggle to survive. People worked long hours for little, bartering farm produce for the few store-bought necessities. Primitive housing, education and medicine sufficed. Both black and white poor suffered brutal exploitation, despite which they review their life with satisfaction. We hypothesize that, to maintain mental health, it is better to idealize the unalterable past. Several global assessments of "morale" are discussed. It is also suggested that this journal become a clearing house for questions that measure psychic wellbeing in the aged more naturally and by indirection than do scales in current use. Language: en

Subsistence Ecology of Scovill

Abstract: The data contained in the paper by Munson, Parmalee, and Yamell (1971) concerning the Scovill site in Illinois have been employed for the purpose of examining the demographic and dietary status of the inhabitants. It is calculated from the meat residues found by the authors that this source of food would have supplied 181,800 g of animal protein, and from the residues of nuts that this type of plant supplied 1,588,000 Calories. The nutritional requirement in these substances for the probable population of the site was very much greater than the residues found. Hence the residues do not approach the probable consumption. On the other hand it is shown that the environment could provide much more meat and nuts than are represented by the human consumption.

The Developing Countries: The Choice of Technology

Abstract: Countries liberated from colonial dependence have embarked on the path of independent economic development in the face of the burgeoning scientific and technological revolution. They are accordingly confronted with a number of specific economic problems - including the problem of selecting technology - in a form in which such problems have never confronted other countries in the past. By the selection of technology we mean the adoption of alternative decisions on the use of various types of equipment that is accessible to the country at any given time. It is not by chance that the economists and economic leaders of the "third world" have recently been focusing their attention on this problem. The economy of today's developing countries is characterized by so motley an assortment of equipment in use at the same time as was not known in the history of any of today's industrially developed countries. On the one hand, primitive manual implements of labor used in small-scale subsistence farming are in common u...

Land: An Extension of the Peasant's Ego

Abstract: This paper examines the place of the land in the peasant's cognitive world. It describes how a particular highland Zapotec people of Shgosho, Oaxaca, view and practice their relationship to the land. The practices of feeding the land and sacrificing the essence of human blood for the land are discussed. It is suggested that the peasant's reverence for the land is related to cultivation of the traditional subsistence crops, and changes with the introduction of modern cash crop economy.

Cultural development population and the family.

Abstract: This paper is concerned with the way changing socioeconomic forces affect both family units and changes in population phenomena related to the ways families function. 3 functions of families are: 1) the sharing of subsistence activities in a small group 2) explicit or implicit rules concerning permissible and prohibited partners in sexual intercourse and 3) joint care for and socialization of children. The decline in the importance of the family in industrial societies is often attributed to husbands and wives not gaining their livelihood participating in the same unit of production. Although the regulation of sexual activity is not the foundation upon which families originated its various forms are important to the relationship of the family to larger units of society and to demographic outcomes. The problem of defining the family is discussed in terms of certain assumptions which state that a single boundary will contain certain kinds of kinship behavior. Detailed discussion concerns the relationship between society and the family and between the family and reproducitive patterns during the major stages of human evolution from hunting gathering bands to feudal states and colonialism. Family forms natality and mortality levels child rearing practices and external forces affecting the family are discussed. A review of social policies that affect families and reproductive behavior is made in addition to comments upon womens status and the implicatiohns for the future of the commune as a family form.