Science and the peasantry

Until about 1965 agricultural research in West Africa, as in many other parts of the tropics, was heavily biased towards ‘export’ crops. The Green Revolution is a phrase coined in the 1960s to describe the increased output obtainable from improved wheat and rice varieties developed by plant breeding research programmes in Mexico and the Philippines. High-yielding varieties developed by CG-System programmes are now quite widespread in West Africa. It seems probable that improved varieties of cassava, rice, maize, sorghum and sweet potato have had the greatest impact. Although CG-System varieties may combine the desirable properties of high yields and resistance to pests and disease they may still fall short of farmers’ requirements in other respects. Trypanosomes are protozoan parasites transmitted by tsetse flies.

Political science · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development · History · Rangeland Management and Livestock Ecology · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies