Abstract
Agricultural modernization requires large-scale investment in rural physical infrastructure—roads, electrification, communications, computer access. Infrastructure must be constantly upgraded. Agricultural modernization also requires integrated markets. Marketing margins widen greatly, reducing the incentive to modernize as roads become worse or non-existent. Rural infrastructure is also critical to rural social well-being, including the universal objectives of health and education systems. The highly trained personnel critical to modernization generally refuse to live in areas with a deficient infrastructure. Governments vary tremendously in the extent to which they allocate resources to rural infrastructure. Such investment is an important indicator of government concern or lack of concern for the people of rural areas and rapid agricultural growth.
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Mellor, J.W. (2017). Physical Infrastructure. In: Agricultural Development and Economic Transformation. Palgrave Studies in Agricultural Economics and Food Policy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65259-7_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65259-7_9
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