eprintid: 35949
rev_number: 18
eprint_status: archive
userid: 3114
dir: disk0/00/03/59/49
datestamp: 2025-01-21 13:25:28
lastmod: 2025-01-28 13:11:00
status_changed: 2025-01-21 13:25:28
type: workingPaper
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Bell, Clive
title: Trials and Tribulations: High-Yielding Varieties and Small Farmers in Bihar, circa 1970
subjects: ddc-330
divisions: i-181000
keywords: high-yielding varieties, credit-insurance scheme, Small Farmers Development Agency, Bihar
abstract: This paper recounts an early attempt to promote the adoption of high-yielding varieties (HYVs) of rice and wheat by small farmers. The instrument was a package not only of inputs, extension advice and supervision, but also – addressing risk aversion – a guaranteed net revenue. The scheme was implemented by the newly-created Small Farmers’ Development Agency, a parastatal body. The paper examines how and why the scheme failed, and analyses the data yielded by the trials. The chief causes of its failure were a lack of incentives within the public sector and the Agency’s weakness within the larger administrative system. Despite all manner of difficulties, the participants in the trials obtained levels of valued added per acre thrice those of their contemporaries cultivating local varieties and crop yields from two-thirds to four-fifths of those achieved by
their grand children’s cohort circa 2020.
date: 2025
id_scheme: DOI
id_number: 10.11588/heidok.00035949
schriftenreihe_cluster_id: sr-3
schriftenreihe_order: 0761
ppn_swb: 191537670X
own_urn: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-359495
language: eng
bibsort: BELLCLIVETRIALSANDT20250116
full_text_status: public
series: AWI Discussion Paper Series
volume: 0761
place_of_pub: Heidelberg
pages: 35
citation:   Bell, Clive  (2025) Trials and Tribulations: High-Yielding Varieties and Small Farmers in Bihar, circa 1970.  [Working paper]     
document_url: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/35949/7/Bell_trials_dp761_2025.pdf