ABSTRACT
Several agricultural innovations emanate from old ideas, such as the “vallus” in Roman Gallia. It was a wheel-based trough with sharp knives at the front; the ears were cut and fell into the trough. The British inventor Jethro Tull, considered a father of modern agriculture, created the seed drill in 1701. Seed drilling in rows allowed for more efficient weeding using a horse-drawn hoe. The botanic gardens were the precursors of the Agricultural Departments in the British colonial service. France established botanic gardens in Africa in the beginning of the 20th century and tropical medicine at a laboratory of biological medicine in Saigon in 1871. Community development turned into an agricultural extension service. Great expectations were generated from the introduction of mechanical equipment for land clearing and cultivation. In the late 1950s, agricultural economics became central, one theme being farm management, where linear programming was applied even to tropical peasant agriculture.
