Historical forces in world agriculture and the changing role of international development assistance

The first part of this paper discusses five sets of forces that have had a major influence on world agriculture in the post-World War II period. These include:

1. high rates of population growth in the developing countries
2. a steady increase in economic integration world-wide, driven by technological breakthroughs in the communication and transportation sectors
3. major realignments in the values of national currencies
4. growing distortions in economic policies in both the industrialized and developing countries
5. growing diffusion of new production technology from the industrialized to the developing countries.

The second part reviews the changing role of international development assistance in support of agriculture in light of these historical forces. Such assistance successively stressed the development of extension services, food aid, institutional development of higher level education institutions, the development of research capacity, and rural development.

A look to the future is the subject of the third part of the paper. This includes a discussion of the difficulties in sustaining U.S. foreign assistance, especially when that nation is letting its own economic house fall into such disarray.