Plant Breeding and Poverty: Can Transgenic Seeds Replicate the ‘Green Revolution’ as a Source of Gains for the Poor? 1

Most of the world’s poor depend mainly in farming for their income. Most poor farmers cannot readily farm more land, or obtain more water. Yet the farm population is still growing, and the farm workforce is growing faster. In such circumstances, the conditions for an improved farm technology to benefit all major groups of the working poor ² – those earning income mainly from farming, farm labour, and non-farm rural and urban labour – are tight. The improved farm technology must ‘walk two tightropes’ (Lipton, 2005: 11). It must:

Raise labour productivity, so poor farmers get more reward for effort; but

Raise land and water productivity faster, so employment, on unchanged land and water, rises.

Cut staples prices through increased output (so the non-farm poor gain); but

Raise total factor productivity (conversion of inputs to outputs) faster, so poor farmers gain.