Agricultural Production Economics Analytical Methods and Applications

The Present book is unique in that it seeks to blend the theory of the Production Economics with empirical analysis of exclusively Indian situations. The applications presented here are from research works relating to local issues of the irrigation sector of the southern States of India, particularly Tamil Nadu. The material presented, both theoretical and empirical have been extensively classroom tested over the past two decades. The book contains twelve chapters. Starting with the first chapter on Agricultural Production Process- Selected Agro-economics Procedures explaining the production situation that are analyzed in the book. The second chapter Mathematical Analysis of Production Relationships presents a concise summary of the basic production economics theory forming the basis of subsequent chapters. The concept of the production function that forms the fundamental tool of production economics analysis is reviewed and its conceptual extensions leading to various decision making situations are explored. The subsequent chapters extend the basic theoretical analysis with illustrated empirical applications. These chapters cover the analytical approach to economic optimum, decision making with no risk and uncertainty in agriculture, trend/growth specifications and measurement of inequality, technology, input use and factor shares, economic efficiency in agricultural production, yield gaps, and yield penalties and yield declines. The final two chapters extend the analytical framework from production function analysis to programming approaches and the techniques of project evaluation. The lucid presentation of theory mingled with applications would make this book an ideal one for the graduate and postgraduate students specializing in production economics.