The Wisdom of Tradition in the Development of Dry-land Farming: Botswana

The present understanding of small-farm economies amongst Western aid donors consists of the belief that small-scale producers can be viewed as firms operating in an economic equilibrium of (1) constant technology, (2) constant output choices, (3) use of production factors as a function of their marginal productivity, (4) factor allocation at Pareto optimum, and (5) constant, necessary low productivity. The general presumption for raising the production function is deemed necessarily to consist of and institutional innovation. Case study material from small farms in Botswana show that (1) the prevalent micro-economic imputations listed above are seriously flawed and ideologically motivated: (2) technology transfer effected in Botswana is both unprofitable and destructive of numerous indigenous institutions: and (3) most importantly, the indigenous agricultural regime is capable of considerably greater production with changes in crop management practices and minor changes in the e...