SOUTHERN JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS
JULY, 1975
RESEARCH IN AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS:
PROGRESS, LIMITATIONS, COORDINATION, NEEDS AND PROSPECTS — A DISCUSSION*
Richard A. King
In retrospect, the past 25 years of research in
agricultural economics have been great years for
me. For all but a few months of this period, it has
been my good fortune to work at North Carolina
State University in a department that grew from
a handful of eager young Ph.D.s to a large and
diversified group with wide-ranging interests.
Those years have taken me to many interest-
ing places. I have toured Texas across the Rio
Grande and hydroponic cucumber beds in Puerto
Rico. I have been introduced to such interesting
problems as location of sweet potato processing
plants and selection of appropriate milk pricing
policies. Twenty-five years have brought warm
friendships—from Virginia to Florida and Texas.
Ahead is the prospect of other unusual places,
more challenging problems and new interesting
people.
In discussing the CSRS perspective on research
in agricultural economics, Lloyd Halvorson has
suggested that we talk mostly about the future.
Sometimes this is more difficult than it sounds.
Our local church recently engaged in an appraisal
of its strength and weaknesses. Taped to the walls
were long paper tablecloths on which the two
lists were to be compiled. By the close of that
meeting we had one tablecloth full of strengths
and three tablecloths full of weaknesses! Surely
we could do the same here today. “Past costs are
no costs,” though, as we remind our students.
Who are we? It is true that the name “agri-
cultural economist” no longer seems to convey as
much information as we might wish. We are
becoming more nearly “low density-area people
specialists.” We will be using economic theory and
quantitative methods to deal with tomorrow’s
M. G. Mann Professor, Department of Economics and Business,
* Comments on a paper presented by Lloyd C. Halvorson at the
Sociation, New Orleans, Louisiana, February 2, 1975.
economic problems. Our optimizing processes will
require understanding new technologies as well as
a new generation of people in decision-making
positions. We will focus our attention on alterna-
tive strategies for project formulation, program
design, and policy development across a wide
range of farm and nonfarm activities.
How can all this be done most effectively?
Halvorson suggests the first step is to recognize
our own administrative structure. In a new social
sciences division of the agricultural experiment
station, he proposes establishing three research
groups (departments?) with roughly equal financial
support. They would concentrate on (1) produc-
tion and marketing economics, (2) natural re-
source economics, and (3) community economics.
These represent slight modifications of his title
substituting the noun “economics” for the noun
“development.” For me, development is more ap-
propriately used as an adjective in the phrase
“development strategies” and is, then, equally
appropriate as a working component in each of
the three research areas. Also, “community econ-
nomics” implicitly recognizes potential inputs from
other disciplines, such as sociology and politics,
in community decision-making. Presumably, our
sociologist friends would also be welcomed as
fellow members of a fourth group in such a social
sciences division of each station.
What would be the responsibilities of these
three teams? Group one would concentrate on
commercial agriculture, group two on the use,
protection and enhancement of the environment,
and group three on quality of life as influenced by
the supply of non-market goods and services.
Within each of these areas two types of decision-
North Carolina State University, Raleigh.
annual meeting of the Southern Agricultural Jiconomics As-
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