Information on the spatial distribution of poverty can be useful in designing geographically targeted rural poverty reduction programs. This paper uses recently released município-level data on rural poverty in Brazil to identify and analyze spatial patterns of rural poverty in the São...

Policymakers, managers of water use associations, and many others in developing countries are considering policy actions that will directly or indirectly change the costs and availability of groundwater and surface water for agricultural users. While in many cases such actions may bring about...

Rates of obesity among adults and children in the U.S. are soaring, with potentially huge private and social costs. Increasing attention is being paid to agricultural policies as both the culprits through their perceived roles in reducing the relative prices of energy-dense foods, and as the...

Green Revolution technologies were developed and promoted in the 1960s in response to alarm about impending famine in Asia. By boosting food supplies and fostering development, the technologies were expected to create "breathing space" for completing demographic transitions there. This paper...

During the past three decades, levels of excess weight and obesity have risen significantly in the United States. The reasons are physical, economical and sociological. The second half of the twentieth century is characterized by changes in the diets and levels of activity in the American...

Forests continue to fall for agricultural purposes throughout the humid tropics, with immediate and potentially large consequences for climate change and biodiversity loss-issues of key interest to the international community. Some of the actors directly responsible for forest conversion fell...

Developing countries are under pressure to produce more food for their growing populations, conserve natural resources, and reduce poverty. In the short term, however, these goals may compete with one another. This book focuses on the interactions between agricultural growth and environment and...

In general, reported rates of return to agricultural R&D are high, but questions have been raised about upward biases in the evidence. Among the reasons for this bias, insufficient attention to attribution aspects-matching of research benefits and costs-is a pervasive problem, the magnitude of...