Agricultural Productivity In The Socialist Countries

With the emergence of collectivization, the communal movement, and the food crisis, the development of agriculture in socialist countries has become a topic of great interest to economists. Focusing on productive efficiency, Dr. Wong estimates an agricultural metaproduction function for nine countries--China, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, and the Soviet Union--and computes both the partial productivities and total productivity in comparable units. Using the growth accounting procedure, the author performs a quantitative comparative analysis of the differences and the sources of differences in agricultural productivity among socialist countries. Methods of analyzing productivity measures are described, revealing the contribution of land, labor, education, and other factors in agricultural growth. Dr. Wong concludes by discussing the policy implications for development strategy and the effects on the world food market.

Table of Contents:
List of Tables -- List of Figures – Acknowledgments -- Introduction 1 -- I Agricultural Deyelopment in Socialist Countries (1.1 Introduction 5 1.2 Economic Settings of Socialist Agriculture 6 1.3 Agricultural Growth in Socialist Countries 10 Notes 13) -- II Theory of Productivity and ProductiYity Indices (2.1 Introduction 15 2.2 Sources of Productivity Growth 16 2.3 Index Number Approach 19 2.3.1 The Arithmetic Index 20 2.3.2 The Geometric Index 21 2.4 Production Function Approach 23 2.5 Summary 24 Notes 25) -- Ill Metaproduction Function for Socialist Agriculture (3.1 Introduction 27 3.2 The Metaproduction Function and its Problems 27 3.3 Selection of the Form of the Metaproduction Function 30 3.4 Empirical Model Specifications 31 3.4.1 Problems of Multicollinearity 33 3.4.2 Agricultural Metaproduction Function for Socialist Countries 35 3.4.3 Productivity Functions 39 3.4.4 Centralized vs Less-Centralized Countries 41 3.5 Comparing the Results with Other Studies 43 3.6 Data Quality and Econometric Problems 46 Notes 47) -- IV Culnges In Partial and Total Factor Productivity (4.1 Introduction 49 4.2 Cross-Country Comparison of Partial Productivity 50 4.2.1 Changes in Labor Productivity 50 4.2.2 Changes In Land Productivity 57 4.3 Cross-Country Comparison of Total Factor Productivity 61 4.3.1 Changes in Arithmetic Productivity Index 62 4.3.2 Changes in Geometric Productivity Index 64 4.4 Trends of Productivity Indices 68 4.5 Summary 80 Notes 81) -- V Sources of Agricultural Productivity Culnges(5.1 Introduction 83 5.2 Contribution of Technical Change in Agricultural Growth 84 5.3 Accounting for Sources of Productivity Growth 90 5.3.1 Sources of Labor Productivity Change 90 5.3.2 Sour~es of Land Productivity Change 95 5.4 Intercountry Comparisons of Productivity Differences 98 5.4.1 Sources of Labor Productivity Differences 101 5.4.2 Sources of Land Productivity Differences 104 5.5 Implications of Empirical Findings 108 Notes 110) -- VI Prospects for Socialist Agriculture (6.1 Introduction Ill 6.2 Summary and Empirical Findings 112 6.3 Polley Implications for Productivity Growth 114 6.4 Suggestions for Future Research 120 Notes 121) – Appendixes (A: Aggregate Agricultural Output Series 125 B: Time Series Cross-Country Data 141 C: Principal Components Regression 167 D: Trends of Yearly Shift Factors 173 -- Bibliography -- Index 191.