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On a Dynamic Model for Rural Development in Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Patrick E. Ollawa
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Extract

Over the past decade a pervasive concern of African political leaders, development planners, and social scientists has been to find ways and means of improving the lot of those in the rural areas: they comprise the bulk of the population of the tropical African states and continue in the 1970S to be socially and economically the most deprived social group.1 Despite the ‘highest priority’ assigned to rural development in the policy documents of many African governments, neither the allocation of public funds nor the implementation of development strategies have been energetically directed towards improving the living standards of the rural masses. Equally, the recognition of the need for a new development model by an increasing number of scholars has yet to produce adequate guidance for those African régimes which are seeking to transform the rural areas.

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Articles
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The Journal of Modern African Studies , Volume 15 , Issue 3 , September 1977 , pp. 401 - 423
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1977

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References

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page 410 note 6 Cf. Green, loc. cit. p. 254; Bienen, Henry, Tanzania – Party Transformation and Economic Development (Princeton, 1967 edn.)Google Scholar; Leys, Colin, ‘The Analysis of Planning’, in Leys, (ed.), Politics and Change in Developing Countries (Cambridge, 1969), pp. 247–75Google Scholar; and Nnoli, Okwudiba, ‘External Stimuli and National Planning in Tanzania’, in The African Review (Dar es Salaam), 1, 3, 01 1972, pp. 8–28.Google Scholar

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page 411 note 2 Cf. de la Torre, José, ‘Foreign Investment and Export Dependence’, in Economic Development and Cultural Change, XXIII, 1, 10 1974, pp. 133–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cohen, D. L. and Tribe, M. A., ‘Suppliers' Credit in Ghana and Uganda – an Aspect of the Imperialist System’, in The Journal of Modern African Studies, x, 4, 12 1972, pp. 525–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rweyemamu, J. F., ‘The Political Economy of Foreign Private Investment in the Underdeveloped Countries’, in The African Review, 1, 1, 1971, pp. 108–18Google Scholar; and Langdon, S., ‘Multi-National Corporations, Taste Transfer and Underdevelopment: a case study from Kenya’, in Review of African Political Economy (London), 2, 1972, pp. 12–35.Google Scholar

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page 412 note 1 Cliffe, Lionel, ‘Political Economy of Rural Africa’, University of Zambia, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, R.P.P. No. 1, 1975, p. 40.Google Scholar

page 412 note 2 Computed from Zambia, Monthly Digest of Statistics, XI, 7–8, 07–08 1975, p. 19.Google Scholar

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page 413 note 3 Flores, Xavier, Agricultural Organisation and Development (Geneva, 1971), especially pp. 339–416.Google Scholar

page 414 note 1 For a useful discussion of the implications of the choice of technology for rural development, see Müller, Jens, ‘Appropriate Technology and Technological Dualism’, in Leys, Roger (ed.), Dualism and Rural Developmsnt in East Africa (Copenhagan, 1973), pp. 163–76Google Scholar; and Gotsch, Carl H., ‘Technical Change and the Distribution of Income in Rural Areas’, in American Journal of Agricultural Economics (Urbana, Ill.), 54, 2, 05 1972, pp. 326–41.Google Scholar

page 415 note 1 Tp includes not only such inputs as new crop breeds, fertilisers, irrigation and other sources of water, marketing, storage and credit facilities, supplies of energy, farmer education, research and experimentation, pest control, and other forms of extension services, but also the massive promotion of rural industries that have growth-inducing linkages with the agricultural and other sectors of the economy.

page 416 note 1 Cf. Fafunwa, A. B., ‘Does Formal Schooling Push Young People Out of Agriculture in Africa?’, in Rural Africana (East Lansing), 19, Winter 1973, pp. 56–66Google Scholar; and Employment, Incomes and Equality, pp. 33ff.

page 417 note 1 The notion of sp corresponds closely to Paul Baran's concept of ‘potential economic surplus’ which he distinguishes from ‘actual economic surplus’. See The Political Economy of Growth (Harmondsworth, 1967), especially pp. 132–4.

page 418 note 1 Galbraith, John K., Economic Development (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), p. 46.Google Scholar

page 418 note 2 Tilly, Charles, The Vandee (London, 1964), p. 331.Google Scholar

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page 420 note 2 Waterston, Albert, ‘Preparing a Program for Agriculture’, Economic Development Institute, Seminar Paper No. 5, Washington, 1973, p. 21.Google Scholar

page 421 note 1 Dean, Edwin, Plan Implementation in Nigeria, 1962–1966 (Ibadan, 1972), p. xv.Google Scholar

page 421 note 2 Musuka, Simon Otema, M.P. for Mpika West, quoted in the Times of Zambia (Lusaka), 23 01 1976.Google Scholar

page 422 note 1 Perhaps the greatest weakness of Guy Hunter's otherwise insightful book, Modernising Peasant Societies: a comparative study in Asia and Africa (London, 1969), is his naï;veté in equating radical measures with a ‘communist solution’ because they lead to ‘disorganisation and bitterness’ (p. 149). However, he left one crucial question unanswered: Which is ethically justifiable – the ‘disorganisation’ of the privileged élite or the penury of the rural masses?