ABSTRACT
Significant governmental support of agricultural research has a history of less than a century and a half. The preeminence of British agriculture in the 18th and 19th centuries was based, at least in part, on research undertaken by private individuals, usually on their own farms or estates. The famous Rothamsted Experimental Station was established in 1843 by a private institution and remained as such throughout the remainder of the 19th century. A nation's agricultural research policy has several major components or facets. These include, first, the amount to invest in research; second, the allocation of responsibility or opportunity among the potential providers of research, and, third, the mechanisms for allocating public funds among institutions and among the alternative lines of research. Modern agriculture is of origin. The large differences that one sees in the productivity of land and agricultural labor across countries are also of origin.
