Science, technology, and the economy

Plant breeding in Great Britain, 1920-1970

Bibliographic Data

ID3207247
AuthorsPaolo Palladino (0000-0001-8001-6691, Lancaster University, corresponding author)
Year1996
Volume49
Issue1
Pages116
Publication date1996-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe Economic History Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0013-0117 • E-ISSN: 1468-0289
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2598451
OpenAlexW4251380552
LanguageEN
Citations received10
References cited19

This article examines some connections between scientific research, technological innovation, and British agriculture, during the period I920-70. This is a history of very effective linking between these activities: the total factor productivity of British farmers nearly doubled between the i950s and i99os, and much of this increase was mediated by technical changes.2 One of the major, but often hidden, such mediating agents was the sowing of improved crop varieties. Their purchase, since the I920S, accounted for about IO per cent of the costs of production on British arable farms, and amounts in the i99os to over ?300 million yearly.3 This expense resulted in a virtual doubling of yields of major crops, such as cereals and potatoes, and nearly half of this gain can be attributed directly to genetic improvements, that is to say, to the work solely of geneticists and plant breeders.4 Most of these geneticists and breeders were employed by publicly financed plant breeding centres. By the early i99os, 83 per cent of wheat and 38 per cent of the potatoes grown by British farmers were derived from seeds produced in these centres, which also meant for the latter an attractive income of ?2 million annually (profits after taxes).5 More significantly, the total cost of running these centres, during the period considered here, was a little more than ?6 million, about I-2 per cent of contemporary public investment in agricultural research.6 Not surprisingly, therefore, their achievements have often been used to defend the importance of public support for scientific research generally.7 This successful, and hitherto unexamined, link between science, technology, and the British economy has been ignored by the literature on the

Agricultural economics · Economics · Economy · Geography · Political science · American History and Culture · Historical Economic and Social Studies · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · History of Science and Natural History

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