issue 3 1982 [doi 10.1016_0309-586x(82)90073-5] e.j. clay -- technical innovation and public policy-...

7/28/2019 Issue 3 1982 [Doi 10.1016_0309-586x(82)90073-5] E.J. Clay -- Technical Innovation and Public Policy- Agricultural

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Agricuhrol Admini wofion 9 (1982) 189-210

TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY:AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN THE KOSI REGION,BIHAR, INDIAE. J. CLAY

Institute of Developm ent Studies, University of Sussex,Brighton BNI 9R E; Sussex, Great Britai n

(Received: 22 October, 1980)

SUMMARY

Agricultural development at regional level emergesfrom a review of developments inthe Kosi region of Bihar, India, as a dynamic adaptive process, taking dtjficult toanticipate directions. This is because part of the dynamic force has been provided byendogenous technical and institutional change from within the agricultural system,mostly the result of local informal innovative activity. A flexible administrativeresponse to innovation has also contributed to these developments. A major problemin appraising developments in the Kosi region is to establish exactly what hashappened and assess ts impact. This provides a pointer to areas in which an enhancedadministrative and research capacity is required. A flexible development adminis-tration and a strong adaptive agricultural research capability have much to learnfrom monitoring and exploiting the opportunities indicated by technical develop-ments in the region.

EVER YMA NS OBJECTIVE: INCREASING THE EFFECTIVENES S OF PUBLIC INVESTMEN TS INRURA L DE V E L O P M E NT

In recent years there has been a notable shift of focus in much rural developmentresearch from evaluation to seeking to understand and explain the sources ofvariation in returns to public investment. For example, studies of the returninvestments in agricultural research have shown that there are large variations inrates of return. This has led to a search for explanations of such variability inperformance (Schuh and Tollin i3). Similarly , in research and operational work onirrigation there is a shift of emphasis from evaluation to analysis of managementproblems of established systems with an implic it objective of raising social returns topublic investment (Taylor and Wickhamj). A recent return visi t to the Kos i region189Agricultural Administration 0309-586X/82/0009-0189/$02,75 0 Applied Science Publishers Ltd, England,1982Printed in Great Britain


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190 E. J. CLAYof Bihar, India, by the author after a lengthy period of involvement with agriculturalresearch and rural development problems in neighbouring Bangladesh provokedmany questions and, it is hoped, provided some insights into the process ofagricultural development at the regional level relevant to discussions of how toincrease the effectiveness of public investment in agricultural development.

THE K O S I DE V E L O P M E NT A RE A *

The Kosi region (Fig. 1) comprises the three north-easterndistricts of the Indianstate of Bihar. These have a combined area of 17 thousand square miles and apopulation of over eight million people. The region is well defined, being bounded bythe Kosi and Ganges rivers and the borders with Nepal and the state of West Bengal.The Kosi has the highest flow and silt load of any Ganges tributary and has wreaked

INDIA

lnternahon ol boundary -.-.-State boundary ---RI&~ / cwxt -

Fig. 1. T he Kosi river system and the Kosi re gion, Bihar, India.

* A more deta iled introduction to the Kosi region, its social structure and the Kosi Development Projectis to be found in Biggs, Hoskinsz3 and Wood.34


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 191havoc in North Bihar for centuries. In the last two hundred years it has shifted i tscourse s ixty miles westwards across the present Kosi region in a series of disastrousfloods.Apart from a small area of terai (Piedmont) soils , the region consists of meanderfloodplains of ridges, basins and old channels with more extensive tracts of highersandy-silt soils . Given the monsoon pattern of rainfall and mean rainfall levels,which fall significantly from north-east to south-west, agricultural potential isdetermined under rainfed conditions by micro leve l variations in geo-hydrology.These variations can result in deep-water rice growing within short distances of semi-arid upland crops of millets and mesta (a poor quality fibre crop). This topography,with its complex and changing drainage pattern, also presents considerableproblems in the design and development of a large-scale gravity flow irrigationsystem. In contrast, there is almost unlimited potential for the exploitation ofgroundwater because of the combination of high water tables, rarely more than 3 mbelow the surface due to continuous recharge from the hil ls and the river system, andstone free alluv ial sediments down to considerable depths (Roy and Sinha28).The social structure of the region reflects the complex and often recent pattern ofsettlement in reclaimed tracts. There are sti ll many large estates, some exceeding onethousand hectares in size. These estates have traditionally been sharecropped bytenants-at-will. However, threats of land redistribution, the introduction of thetractor and economic opportunities offered by the Green Revolution, discussedbelow, have led to more direct cultivation with hired labour. Most landlords andlarge-scale farmers belong to higher caste groups. Backwardcastes, associated withcultivation and cattle herding, are represented in large numbers, and the formerconstitute a minority of genuine self-cultivating small peasant proprietors.Scheduled castes (untouchables) and scheduled tribal groups, who constitute 16 %of the population and are mostly landless, were brought in to reclaim land and tocultivate by those acquiring legal title. There is also a significant Muslim minority inspite of a considerable exodus of Muslims at the time of partition (after 1947).Immigration continues of backward and scheduled caste people who have beenattracted by employment and tenancy opportunities.

The typical settlement pattern is not that of nucleated villages but of hamletsoccupied by a single caste-kinship group. Nearby hamlets are linked by economicand ritual transactions. For example, families from a labourers hamlet work directlyas field labourers, household servants and/or sharecroppers for families in one ormore nearby landowning communities. The village, as administratively defined forland revenue collection and census enumeration with boundaries established by theaccidents of land settlement registration, often does not coincide with aneconomically interrelated set of hamlets. The Kosi region is perceived to be abackward area within one of the poorest and politically most unstable states inIndia. It has only a few small towns and little industry with 94 % of its populationbeing rural (1971 census). However, alongside these problems, the region also has


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E. J. CLAY

many of the characteristics of a frontier melting pot. With the coming of the KosiProject it was recognised as having considerable agricultural development potential.A major multi-purpose river valley scheme, the Kosi Project, involving a barrageand embankments to control the Kosi river, the provision of canal irrigation for anestimated 1.4 mill ion acres and a small hydroelectric station, was initiated in 1954.

The canal system opened in 1964. This was followed in 1966 by the introduction ofan Intensive Agricultural Areas Programme (IAAP) and a High Yielding VarietiesProgramme (HYVP), the institutional forms of the first phase of the GreenRevolution. The IAAP replicated the original package programme model,pioneered with Ford Foundation support in the early 1960s (Browng). First, itinvolved the identification of a region of greater potential for intensified agriculturalproduction, usually because of irrigation capacity already existing or beingdeveloped. Inside the Kosi region, twenty-one of fifty-nine CommunityDevelopment Blocks, each with a population in 1971 of around 100,000 in 50 to 100villages, were selected for inclusion in the IAAP. The basic extension staff of villageworkers (VLWs) of these blocks was doubled and some additional agriculturalspecialist posts were created at the block headquarters. The extension structure ofthe IAAPwas headed by a senior agricultural scientist as Special Deputy Director ofAgriculture. The IAAP provided a base on which was built a sequence of otherinitiatives and special programmes, such as credit for lift irrigation and other formsof agricultural machinery, a land levelling project and a Small FarmersDevelopment Agency.

The initial priority in Kosi was the HYVP which involved planning andimplementing the physical distribution and extension of high yielding variety (HYV)seed supplies and complementary inputs. The HYVs included the dwarf Mexicanwheats and semi-dwarf rices and insignificant quantities of hybrid maize. A KosiArea Development Commissioner (KADC), a high level administrator drawn fromthe elite generalist cadre of the Indian Administrative Service, was appointed to co-ordinate agricultural development activities with the work of the Kosi IrrigationProject. This had its own administrative structure as part of the state irrigationservice and was responsible for the construction, maintenance and operation of theflood control and canal system. From 1972, with the creation of a new Kosi Divisionof the three districts, the functions of the KADC were merged with the many otherresponsibilities of the Divisional Commissioner, who was in charge of the whole civ iladministration of the region. The IAAP was extended, in 1970/71, to all 59 blocks inthe region and was later superseded by other initiatives such as the OperationsResearch programme of special projects.

A GREEN REVOLUTION IN QUESTION

The problematic character of the Green Revolution occurring in the backward ruraldistricts of Purnea and Saharsa was first brought to the attention of a wider audience


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 193by a field trip report of the late Wolf Ladejinsky. 25 The technical breakthrough tosignificantly higher levels of land productivity was found to be largely confined to theexpansion ofwheat cultivation, even in this eastern traditional rice and jute growingregion. The first generation of semi-dwarf miracle rice, a phrase that hasfortunately been dropped even from journal istic usage, was substituting for existingvarieties to only a very limited extent, because of the need for precise water controland of susceptibility to pests. Man-made institutional inequalitieswere resulting inthe beneficial effects of the Green Revolution accruing only to the relative ly few,whilst also restricting the potential for agricultural growth. Ladejinskys analysis,drawing on qualitative material from both Kosi and the Punjab, has become part ofthe general wisdom about the character of the Green Revolution, amplified-butnot essent ially modified-in many widely read and more fully documented studies.(For example, those of Griffin,22 Dasguptai8 and, spec ifically on the Kosi region,Clay .I )A decade later, it is intriguing to ask to what extent the analysis and prognoses ofLadejinsky have been confirmed by developments in the Kosi region, as well as toexplore questions prompted by subsequent research. To what extent has there been aGreen Revolution and has this been only a single discrete outward shift in theproduction possibility brought about when the transfer of technological knowledgeenabled India to catch up on developments of biological and machine technologyelsewhere?

TECHNICAL CHANGE IN AGRICULTURE

If much of the detailed analysis of a decade ago has been confirmed by laterdevelopments, the implic it conceptual model of the process of technical change inpeasant agriculture, on which so much of the work of that period was based, looksincreasingly unsatisfactory. Technical change was perceived virtually as a top downprocess of making available new ideas, new inputs or improved variants of existingtechnology. These would disseminate or diffuse with the rates of flow depending onsuch factors as the organisation of production, larger farms adopting earlier andtenancy impeding change by reducing the returns to innovation for the actualcultivator. Al l these factors affect the process of technical innovation, but the theoryis incomplete-missing out the linkages, feedbacks and, above all,the critical role ofdecentralised adaptation and innovation that has always been an essential part ofthe process of agricultural growth. This is much more than the process of trial anderror-i.e. of farmers learning how to use a new input-a fact of which Ladejinsky,as a keen observer, was aware. The need for a fuller theory of the process ofagricultural growth in which technical change is, to a considerable degree,endogenously determined is illustrated by developments in biological technology,irrigation and the institutionalisation of machine technologies in the Kos i regionover the past decade.


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E. J . CLAYThe Green Revolution in Kosi has been primarily a wheat revolution. Officialstatist ics indicate that the area under wheat has increased from a little over one

hundred thousand acres in 1965/66 to four hundred thousand acres in 1970/71 andto between five and six hundred thousand acres in 1977178. My own eye assessmentof the 1978/79 crop in a rapid journey through the region was that the area underwheat had approximately doubled since 1970/71. A more precise estimation isimpossible because of inconsistencies in the crop reports from different sources(Table 1). The area under wheat is now equivalent to a third of the acreage of rice, theTABLE 1

AREA UNDER SOME MAJOR FIELD CROPS IN THE KOSI REGION (000 ACRES)Year 196516 1970/l 197516 197718

1. RiceModern varieties n 0.1 64 220 329Total *1376 1746 1743 naModern as per centof total


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 195adaptability of the dwarf wheats has made possible extensive planting under rainfedconditions, exploiting residual soil moisture and the occasional winter shower. Thisdevelopment was not anticipated a decade ago and provides the first example ofsuccessful experimentation with-and adaptation of-an exotic technology by localcultivators. A similar rapid expansion of rainfed wheat has occurred in West Bengaland Bangladesh where extension efforts also initially focused on those with assuredwater from lift irrigation (West Bengal Government,33 Clay14). The onlyreservation about rainfed HYV must be that production thereby continues toexpand under conditions in which output remains vulnerable to inadequate orunusually distributed rainfall.The area under modern (HYV) varieties of rice apparently began to expand quiterapidly during the 1970s accounting for 13 % of total rice area in 1975/76 (Table 1).There are, however, reasons for considerable scepticism about these estimates. Notechnical breakthrough has occurred to make available more widely adaptablevarieties for main Kharif (monsoon) season cultivation: the earlier semi-dwarfvarieties, such as TNl, IR8, Padma and Jaya, are suited for irrigated summercultivation but, due to the closure of the canal for annual repairs and desilting,irrigation in that season is mostly available from tubewells. Lift irrigation has notbeen widely used for rotations of wheat followed by summer rice, because of timingand the high rates of water losses from the sandy soils on which many tubewells arelocated. Evidence from elsewhere in the Indian sub-continent has also indicatedgross over-reporting of the HYV area by lower level agricultural staff under pressureto fulfil targets that are difficult to verify (Chinnappa, BADC3). During researchthat covered many parts of the Kosi region in 1970/71, I saw litt le of the 64thousand acres under HYV rice reported for that year. Instead, what I and othersfound was the relative ly wider adoption of improved taller photo-sensitive Indicavarieties such as BR 34. These varieties originate from earlier Indian research beforethe advent of the semi-dwarfs and have spread by seed exchange or sales in the localmarket. These developments are again paralleled in Bangladesh where Mahsuri(Pajam) an Indian-Japonica cross, and Nizersail, an improved Indica varietyreleased in the 1940s have become two of the most popular main Khar$(Aman)varieties. Seed is diffused informally by exchange and market purchase.Offic ial s tatist ics also indicate an initia l increase in area under Khauif(monsoonseason) rice cultivation with the advent of canal irrigation in the mid-1960s. Furtherexpansion of the irrigated area in the region during the following decade, combinedwith the considerable expansion of tubewell irrigation, appears to have had littlefurther impact on the total area under rice cultivation, either through increasedKharijseason cultivation or multiple cropping. This could have been anticipated ifthe irrigation engineers and planners had taken actual land use and agriculturaldevelopment potential into account in estimating irrigation development pos-sibili ties. The relatively high average rainfall already allowed rice cultivation as abroadcast, upland early monsoon (Bhadai) crop or as a transplanted main season


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E. J. CLAY

(Aghani) crop, or even as a broadcast deep-water rice crop. Only the highest sandyland is too dry for even a poor crop of upland rice, but these tracts would remainlargely outside the command of a gravity flow canal system. In the Khavzfseason thecanal therefore provides only supplementary water to existing rice land and thiswould be cri tically important only in a drought year such as 1972. If evidence wereavailable on the extent of additional waterlogging caused by the canal system, itmight even emerge that the additional land brought under rice cultivation has, tosome extent, been offset by continuous waterlogging of lower lying paddy land.Another innovation in cropping practice observed on the recent field trip is thespread of Rubi (winter) maize cultivation combined, as the crop reports confirm,with a substantial increase in total maize area and the use of improved varieties.Much of this Rabi season maize is cultivated in relatively tiny plots by cultivatorswho would fall within the officially designated classes of marginal and smallfarmers, with less than 2.5 acres and between 2.5 and 5 acres, respectively. Many areirrigating this cereal crop by hand pump-another innovation. They are typically ofthe traditional vegetable grower caste, producing maize for their own consumption.The introduction of winter maize, with higher water requirements and a lengthygrowing period, but probably very high yields per day in the ground, posesinteresting questions for both researchers and extension workers. Under whatconditions has cultivator experimentation shown the introduction of irrigated Rabimaize into the cropping rotations to be preferred to dwarf wheat? If maize has agreater potential as a poor mans crop, does this indicate a need for a shift in researchpriorities towards maize for at least some agricultural research stations?The application of nitrogenous fert iliser on rainfed Rabi season mustard wasnoted at some sites-again a cultivator innovation that has been occurringspontaneously and widely in Bangladesh. More favourable recent relative prices ofoil seeds compared with food grains have probably induced cultivators toexperiment, finding that, even on residual moisture, the application of urea as asource of nitrogen can triple and quadruple yields with existing varieties.

The widespread adaptive trial and error research by cultivators is only justbeginning to be paralleled in formal agricultural research. North-east Bihar, incommon with the rest of the north of the sub-continent, has been able to benefit fromwidely adapted varieties of wheat essentially developed elsewhere. (Kalyansona,under the name Mexipak, was the most successful variety in Pakistan andBangladesh in the 1960s and in the past five years Sonalika has been the most widelysown variety in Bangladesh. See Dalrympler7 for an account of the development ofthese varieties and the most up to date evidence on the worldwide diffusion of HYVwheat and rice.) In rice, even the most optimistic view reflected in official statist icsindicates that the impact of the modern semi-dwarf varieties has been limited. Thesuccess of earlier genetic research embodied in varieties such as ADT-27, Mahsuriand BR34, is accounted for by their superiority over even earlier released ortraditional varieties in a wide range of conditions at modest levels of input use-say,40 kg/ha of N and P rather than the 80 to 120 kg/ha envisaged in many extension


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 197recommendations. The accidental way in which some varieties have been found to fitdifferent ecological niches is perhaps explained by the limited amount of truly basicresearch that has been done on existing cropping systems, the performance andpotential of traditional farmer-named varieties and land races and the impact ofearlier varietal improvements. There are few farm management studies and hardlyany agronomic studies of improved varieties and of the factors which explain thedisplacement of earlier varieties-such as improved yield, responsiveness tofertiliser, timing, grain quality, pest or disease resistance. Until extensive studies areundertaken in cultivators fields it wil l be impossible, for example, to evaluate thegenetic improvements reported by research workers. (The problem of evaluatingongoing agricultural research without solid evidence on farm level performance isillustrated by a report on deep-water rice research in Bihar (Saran and Sahaiz9). Thereported performance in trials of selections made on the station is not significant lyhigher than the actual farm level performance of many varieties in neighbouringBangladesh (Clay et al. 5). Without similar farm field studies in Bihar, it is difficultto evaluate the reported research on varietal improvement.)

IRRIGATION

The most impressive economic development in the Kosi region over the past decadehas been the spectacular expansion of lift irrigation, brought about by the localdevelopment of the bamboo tubewell: the number of tubewells has increased fromless than three thousand in 1969/70 to almost six ty thousand in 1977/78 (Table 3). Insharp contrast, the Kosi canal system has yet to reach even 20/, of the nowabandoned original target of 1.5 million acres to be irrigated annually. The canalproject has also been beset with problems of siltation and waterlogging, whichpossibly only further massive investment might overcome, unless there is a furtherreduction in targetted irrigated area. These contrasting developments provide aclassic case study of the combination of circumstances that, across the Indo-Gangetic plains, have induced those with the resources and access o credit to investin privately controlled lift irrigation rather than to rely on surface or even publictubewell systems for the supply of water.The evidence from crop reports and irrigation department statis tics is hard toreconcile, but together indicates that the impact on agricultural production of theKosi irrigation system, so far confined to the area under the command of the KosiEastern Main Canal, has been slight. During the initia l phase of canal operationbetween 1965 and 1970 the reported area under main Kharif season irrigationreached almost 200 thousand acres, whilst the total area under rice was estimated tohave expanded by almost 400 thousand acres. These estimates are difficult toreconcile. It i s doubtful whether the earlier expansion of rice area can be attributedto the extension of canal irrigation, because water was largely made available to


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198 E. J. CLAYTABLE 2

AREA IRRIGATED BY KOSI CANAL SYSTEM, 19641978 (000 ACRES)Year Kharif

(monsoon season)Rabi

(winter season)Hot weather

seasonTotal

(annual)1964151965161966171967181968/91969/701970/71197112197213197314197415197516197617197718

1061153265250265172144343223218345346370

y1527 3039 32244656664587749680

-2

11

Fi.3)49aaaaa

1064179322321289218207458268305419436450

Source: Kosi Command Area Development Agency, Saharsa.a Closed for repair and desiltin g operations. The sum of seasonal estimates may notequal the total, due to rounding errors.

TABLE 3RABI SEASON IRRIGATION BY SOURCE IN THE KOSI REGION,1976177

Source Area (000 acres) % TotalCanal 43.2 26.1State tubewells 3.1 1.9Private tubewells 95.5 58.2Other* 22.9 13.8Total 165.7 100.0Source: Kosi Command Area Development Authority,(Quoted in Singh3r). Includes both metal and bamboo tubewells.* Includes lift irrigation by pump from open water, handpumps and traditio nal methods such as swing baskets.

existing rice lands. Nor is there evidence of substitution of rice for jute in this period(Table 1). Later, the apparent extension of supplementary irrigation and the spreadof modern varieties would, in the absence of any counteracting factors depressingyields, have been expected to have resulted in higher production. Since 1971 thecanal irrigated area in the main Kharif season is estimated by the irrigationadministration to have doubled (Table 2), but rice area (Table 1) and yields haveapparently stagnated.

During the Rabi season, when irrigation is essential for even moderately highyields of wheat or maize (in excessof 2 tons/ha), the Irrigation Department estimatesthat only 80 thousand acres are irrigated by the canal whereas the Kosi CommandArea Development Authority attributes a mere 40 thousand acres-26% of the


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 199seasonal total irrigation area-to canal irrigation. The canal has been closed sincethe drought year of 1972/73 during the summer (the season with the greatestpotential for irrigated semi-dwarf rice cultivation), due to maintenance and desiltingoperations. In addition, an unknown area of lower lying land has been affectedadversely by waterlogging due to the rising water tables. The actual collection ofwater rates has averaged less than 30 % of supposed current water use except in theunusual circumstances of the emergency when, in 1975/76, it reached 60 %. There isno way of knowing what combination of overestimation of irrigated area, actualnon-payment for water used and underestimation of yields accounts for a physicaland financial performance that is unimpressive, even without reference to theoriginal inflated estimates of potentially irrigable areas. (As part of the collection in1975/76 was accounted for by arrears, the 60 % provides no clue to actual irrigatedarea. As the basis of irrigation statis tics is eye estimation by Irrigation Depart-ment staff, there is also scope for overestimation (Plant,26 p. 72).)

Written and spoken contributions to a symposium on the Kosi Project in Patna,the state capital, in 1979 indicated that there have been deficiencies in the planning,management and organisation of the Kosi project-problems unfortunatelycommon to most major irrigation projects. (The Proceedings of the seminar areavailable from Dr T. Prasad, Bihar State College of Engineering, Patna. A detailedstudy of the Kos i irrigation administration reported at the seminar (Pant26)indicated weaknesses and problems common to many other canal projects in thesub-continent (Bottra ll).) For example, the original design and estimates ofpotentially irrigable area reflected crude and outdated assumptions about waterduties and not detailed field investigations of cropsoil-water requirements. Thetarget estimate of annual irrigated area-l.5 million acres-did not even take fullaccount of high land out of command, existing waterlogged areas and land not inagricultural use. It was not anticipated that the heavy silt deposition resulting fromlarge-scale flow of water through the system in the main Kharifseason would restrictsummer irrigation. (In 1975 a Technical Review Committee subsequently reducedthe potential annually irrigable area to just over 900 thousand acres-half of theoriginal estimate-by merely taking account of those physical factors that limit thegross and net command area. An estimate of irrigation potential based on specif iccrop water requirements and the technical characteristics of the actual system hasyet to be undertaken.) The system design also lacked a drainage component toprevent increased waterlogging. Technical weaknesses in design, operation andconstruction at system or micro level have been compounded by the managerial andinstitutional problems of the irrigation bureaucracy. It is ill equipped through lackof agricultural or management training to operate an irrigation system, whilstworking within a structure of incentives that encourages a preoccupation withconstruction work and not system management (Pant 26).It is often assumed that the relationships between bureacracy and cultivatorswork to the advantage of the more influential members of the community, althoughthe 1971 Agricultural Census (Singh31) and a study by Biggs and Burns4 suggest that


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200 E. J. C LAYcanal water is relatively equitably distributed in terms of holding size. The failure oflarge-scale farmers to monopolise the benefits of canal irrigation is sometimesexplained in terms of their fear of implementation of land holding ceilings. Theseland holding ceil ing maxima are halved for irrigated land and irrigation recordscould provide embarrassing evidence on ownership. However, many large-scalefarmers are investing in tubewells, suggesting other reasons for their limited interestin canal irrigation. Many prefer to acquire irrigation systems under their owncontrol rather than to depend on the canal. Many large-scale farmers also havesizeable and consolidated upland plots which are out of canal command, but ideallysuited for irrigated winter crops, wheat and potatoes, that give the highest return toirrigation (Clay l).When Ladejinsky identified the major constraint on the exploitation of theabundant groundwater resources of the region as the capital cost of tubewells, thenaround Rs. 4000 to 6000 for a 4-in diameter well, local experimentation with avariety of cost-reducing innovations had already brought down the sunk cost of atubewell to less than Rs. 200. The locally assembled bamboo tubewell, constructedfrom split bamboos, coconut coire, old cans and pitch, by village artisans, sunk by asimple labour-intensive jetting method and powered by a mobile diesel pumpmounted on a bullock cart, presents a classic example of the successful adaptation ofa technology to local environment and factor proportions. This development wasalso no chance occurrence, but the outcome of widespread experimentation in anarea with lower cost materials and methods of sinking that finds many parallels inthe adaptation of irrigation technology elsewhere (Clay13,16).As important, but less appreciated, have been the institutional innovation (thechange in economic relationships that lowered sti ll further the costs of tubewellirrigation) and the role of the development administration, alert to the possibil itiesof this innovation for accelerating the rate of investment and in broadeningparticipation in the benefits of tubewell irrigation. Before the introduction ofagricultural machines, such as the pumpset, tractor, huller and thresher, the majoreconomic transactions between social classes distinguished by assets and ritualstatus were the supply of labour and animal draught services by the landless or smallowner-cultivators and the land and credit made available in return by landlords andrich peasants (Biggs and Burns6). The purchase of indivisible equipment has beenassociated with the establishment of markets or novel forms of transaction in theservices of these machines. Those with the financial capacity to invest-usually ofrelatively higher status-now sel l these services to those unable to acquire their ownequipment. The scale of the market in pumpset services s indicated by the changingratio of pumpsets to tubewells after the appearance of the bamboo tubewell (Table4). The growth of the market in machine service enabled many more cultivators tosink tubewells, relying on the hiring in of pumpsets. The sinking of bamboo wells oncomparatively smaller plots than earlier metal cased wells has also been followed bythe development of a market in water.


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 201TABLE 4

IRRIGATION EQUIPMENT AND OTHER AGRICULTURAL MACHIN ES IN THE KOSIAREA

1965166 1970/71 1972173 19771781. Tubewells:State tubewells

Private metal 200Private bambooTotal 2002. Pumpsets:Diesel powered 336Electric powered 63Total 399(Ratio of privatetubewells to pumpsets) 0.50

3. Tractors 3944. Threshers 63

3867 354y1438 195005305 230442693 nas 22087

435 nas 11483128 6589 232351.70 3.50 2.38

1034 1446 na260 400 na

193521150187

55591

Sources: 1965166, 1970171, 1972173: Biggs and Burns4; 1917/X3: KosiCommand Area Development Agency.na = not available.

The development administration has also played an important role in facilitatingthe spread of locally developed tubewell technology. The bamboo tubewell was firstchampioned by the Specia l Deputy Director of Agriculture in Saharsa District ,using the package administration extension staff to promote the innovation. Thiswas initially in the face of considerable scepticism and opposition from engineers(with inflexible textbook notions of the appropriate technical specifications oftubewells) and from credit agencies committed to targets for self-financedinvestment in more costly metal tubewells. The intervention of the Kosi AreaDevelopment Commissioner was required in 1970/71 to adjust the fine print ofcentrally funded credit programmes to allow owners of bamboo wells to purchasepumpsets on credit, where loans had previously been restricted to investment in ametal cased well of approved specification and pumpset. In the drought year of1972/73 the first Kosi Divisional Commissioner was responsible for making creditavailable on a large scale for bamboo tubewells to small farmers, thus extending thebenefits of innovation to some degree outside the large farmer group that hadbeen the first to exploit the new low-cost technique. The number of wells rose fromfifteen hundred in mid-1971 to over nineteen thousand a year and a half later. Thisexample of a flexible and positive response to local innovation is, to some extent, areflection on the quality of the staff involved in the early years of the Kosi AreaDevelopment. It also underlines the importance of providing an administrativestructure in which regional or project administrators are given the authority tomodify the specifics of the component programmes in the light of local experience,whilst working towards the broader development objectives of the overallprogramme. This is, however, not necessarily an argument for administration bygeneralists, but is one for delegation of authority to a decentralised regional


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202 E. J. CLAYadministration staffed by a cadre that is not personally committed to specificdepartment projects. (An invidiousprofessional rivalry between groups such as theengineers, agriculturalists and generalists bedevils development administration inBihar. This rivalry owes much to the direct recruitment of a separate elite generalistcadre, instead of drawing into the central administration professionals from any ofthe specialised groups at a middle level, on the basis of performance criteria.Irrigation and agriculture would not be such backward castes, attracting, to aconsiderable extent, the less successful students, if these professions offered someprospects of promotion into high administrative positions.)These developments have had little impact on the activities and perceptions aboutappropriate irrigation strategies of departments with established programmes andinterests. At the 1979 Patna seminar there was minimal discussion of theimplications of developments in groundwater irrigation. Many irrigation engineerssimply responded to the poor performance of the Kosi project by stressingdifficulties outside their control at the micro farmer end of the system. The engineerssolution to the silt problem was another massive civi l engineering project-a highdam at Varakh Chatra in Nepal-and soi l conservation, also in the hil ls. Yet thewillingness of cultivators to invest in dry season irrigation and the apparent limitedimportance of Khavifirrigation imply that there would be gains from reorganisingthe existing system. First, more water should be delivered in the dry season when itcould give the highest return. Secondly, canal flow can contribute to managing watertable recharge, complementing groundwater development.In the light of the success of the bamboo tubewell, the implementation of a smallbut costly programme for sinking large diameter public deep-tubewells in the Kosiregion since 1971 is indefensible (Table 3). The high water tables (over most of theregion, less than 3 m below the surface just before the monsoon rains) make it hardto understand the technical rationale for deep-tubewells unless these were sited onlyon exceptionally high tracts or on the less permeable terai soils in the north-east.This has not been the case: the wells have been shared between the three districts.The capital cost of two hundred deep-tubewells exceeds the cost of the total stock ofover 50 thousand bamboo tubewells. The installed public tubewells, with a meanRabi season irrigated area of 23 acres, account for only 2.3 % of the seasonal total(Table 4). In spite of a technical capacity to command about 75 acres a season,assuming ideal location and investment in an expensive system of lined channels,this poor performance is little different from the disappointing experience elsewherethat resulted in the de-emphasising of public tubewell development during IndiasFourth and Fifth Five Year Plans (Clayr3).The decision to proceed with public investment in deep-tubewells, allocating asmall number of wells to each district-and thereby, incidentally, raising theinvestment costs of an already doubtful programme-+an perhaps best be explainedin terms of the pressures to distribute public investment across the whole state. Thesiting of the one well which I had a chance to observe, on a 24-acre plot belonging to


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 20 3a former zamindari family, is also consistent with experience elsewhere: publicinvestments whose sitings are open to influence are used for purposes of politicalpatronage and private gain with resulting suboptimal location and performance.It would be unfortunate if the interests of (large) minor irrigation organisationsrequiring additional allocations to public sector tubewell programmes were tooutweigh the strong economic case against excessive investment in a widelyinappropriate technique. Except where geohydrologic conditions restrict the choiceof technique to structures drawing upon deeper groundwater, private tubewellirrigation is like ly to be both more efficient and less negalitarian within the existingsocio-economic structure.

THE DISTRIBUTIONAL IMPLICATIONS OF TECHNICAL CHANGE

Because the available studies on the distributional impact of technical change-canal irrigation (Prasad2), tubewells and tractors, (Clayr2, Biggs and Burns4)-aswell as the agricultural census evidence, all date from the early 1970s it is onlypossible to make qualitative inferences about the implications of more recentdevelopments. The lower cost of tubewell investment and the availability in selectedblocks of credit from the Small Farmers Development Agency are reported to haveallowed a wider group, including those with secure title to holdings in excess of 23acres, to participate in the benefits of technical change. In the blocks close to PurneaDistrict headquarters there is a visib le increase in the productivity of small peasantproprietors of the vegetable grower castes. The continuing tension and bloodyconflicts between sharecroppers and landowners in other parts of the region, whereeach harvest stil l forces the administration to bring in reinforcements of armedpolice, are a reminder that the landowning small farmer with a hectare of land is aspecial case. The 1971 Agricultural Census in fact showed 60% of cultivatinghouseholds as holding less than 1 ha (Table 5). Evidence on the impact of technicalchange up to the early 1970s also unambiguously showed that the larger peasant

TABLE 5DISTRIBUTION OF LANDHOLDING HOUSEHOLDS AND OWNED LAND IN THE KOSI REGION 1951-1971

Landholdingsize (acres) Per cent of landholding households1951 1961 1971 Per cent of land1961 1971Less than 2.5 68 34 60 5 142.5-49

4.9-9.910.0-14~915.s29.93OG

20> 921

3124973

Total 100 100 100 100 100Source: Adapte d from 1951, 1961, 1971 Census informatio n by Biggs and Burns.4


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proprietors were the major beneficiaries of technical change. Nor should theimportant role of local innovation and adaptation of technology obscure the factthat the pattern and consequences of innovation reflect the existing distribution ofassets and income streams, capacity to pay and to gain access to resources.Some of the literature on the bamboo tubewell has emphasised the potentialbenefits of this innovation to the small cultivator (Dommen,r Appu) withoutoffering quantitative evidence. The experimentation that lay behind this develop-ment was largely carried out by large landowners interested in reducing thecost of investment and extending tubewell irrigation on their fragmented holdings.Few cultivators with less than one hectare are likely to own a plot of the minimumsize of about one acre needed to justify investment in a bamboo tubewell (Clay1 ).The available excess pumping capacity of larger landowners able to obtain credit orraise the cash to buy a pumpset also limits the number of those who can rely on hireservices. The burden of proof lies upon those who would see a single cost-reducinginnovation as likely to substantially broaden the group directly participating intubewell irrigation.The spread of machine threshing perhaps illustrates, better than any other recentdevelopment, the problematic character of induced innovation, especially for thereally poor-i.e. the landless agricultural labourer. Farm management studiesindicated that a typical package of innovations increased output at 1970/7 1 prices by104 %, expanded the employment of agricultural labour by 36 % and raised labourincome by 46 %. The package of innovations included tubewell irrigation and partialmechanisation of land preparation, with the introduction of dwarf wheat as themajor change in cropping rotation (Clay). But the estimate of the potentialbenefits to agricultural labour assumed the maintenance of share payments in kindat existing rates for harvesting and threshing by traditional methods whichaccounted for over 40 y0 of the additional payments to labour. However, mostfarmers with upwards of approximately 10 tons of wheat production, possible on anirrigated plot of 3 to 4 acres, were having serious problems in getting the cropthreshed after harvest by traditional methods. There is a risk of crop loss from KalBaisakhi thunder storms which can damage the standing crop and spoil theunthreshed grain. At threshing time there is also competing demand for bullocks toprepare land for the early Khavifjute and rice crops. The farmers with tractors orthose relying on tractor hire who had reduced the number of their draught animalshad also restricted their capacity to cope with the increased threshing problem bytraditional methods.Returning to the Kosi area after eight years, I found that earlier apprehensionsabout the possibi lity of widespread mechanisation of threshing that would have sucha serious impact on labour incomes were justified. Not only had machine threshingspread very quickly during the last five years, according to informants: but a customthreshing market had also developed for cultivators without their own threshers.

These threshing machines are usually powered by the diesel engines of pumps ortractors and typically have a capacity to thresh about 2.5 maunds (almost 1 tonne)


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 205during an 8-h day, the operation requiring two labourers. Large landowners, I wasinformed, have machines for their own use, whilst many smaller farmers with excessthreshing capacity have, as I saw, entered the custom service business, set up by theroadside. The custom service charge was reported as 1/14th by weight, substantiallymore than the cost of threshing with hired labour (1/16th and l/24) but, of course,also saving in the use of bullocks. It was not possible to quantify the extent of thisnew phenomenon which has occurred since 1973 when there were already 400threshers in the region. However, the existence of over 22 thousand diesel-poweredpumpsets, used primar ily to irrigate Rabi wheat, already provides enough potentialpower to thresh the whole wheat crop. The widespread complementary investmentin hulling equipment-again to be powered by diesel pump engines-noted earl ier(Clay) also exploits spare machine power capacity and probably substitutes forhired female labour in rice processing and grinding wheat in the homes of thewealthier landowners.Quantification of the impact of these innovations on the rural poor must awaitfurther study, but previous farm management studies indicate that work equivalentto between 10 and 16 man-days per tonne, according to whether wheat is threshedwith bullocks or manually, as well as up to 60 kg of labour income in kind per tonneof output, are lost through the mechanisation of threshing.The mechanisation of post-harvest operations epitomises the problematiccharacter of technical change where the path of innovation reflects the economicinterests of that minority of large farmers who constitute the potential market foragricultural machinery. It is hard not to be impressed by this example of robust ruralcapitalism in the making: innovation breaks a bottleneck and reduces risks of croploss whilst exploiting spare machine capacity. The additional investment in athresher of about Rs. 2500 could be recouped by a 20-acre farmer in 2 years fromreduced labour costs without attempting to value the reduction in risk, saving onmanagement costs and bullock requirements. (Assume 20 acres under rice at only 15maunds per acre and 5 acres of wheat yield ing 30 maunds per acre, and value outputat Rs. 50 a maund. Manual labour costs in threshing would amont to Rs. 3 permaund (l/16) or over Rs. 2700 over two years.) The development of custom hire atprices that bring no saving in threshing costs suggests that the inducement toinnovate was the technical bottleneck in threshing, not rising labour costs. As in thecase of the earl ier development of pumpset and tractor markets, farmers areresponding to economic incentives by technical and institutional innovation.However, in some circumstances, the innovation is like ly to be at the expense of theagricultural labourers, unless they can combine to defend their position.

THE TENURIAL QUESTION AND KOSI KRANTI

Ladejinsky and others (Appu, Hoskinsz3 Franda) have seen the character oftenurial relations as the key to the agrarian problem in the Kosi region. Harvest-time


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E. J. CLAY

violence is sti ll commonplace between landlord and sharecroppers, especially fromscheduled tribal communities, such as the Santals, who have more social cohesion.These problems are not the Green Revolution turning red but the continuation oftroubled agrarian relationships that go back more than a century, institutionalisedin the way parts of the region were settled by tribal and scheduled caste groupsdominated by higher caste families who obtained legal titles to the land (Hoskins,Wood34). It is also true that sharecroppers without legal title cannot participate inthe benefits of technical change and that the increased profitability of self-cultivation, as well as fears of implementation of land holding ceiling laws, may haveled to evic tions. Nevertheless, as long as there are widespread estates of hundreds-and even thousands-of acres, the technology of cultivation and managementproblems make the continuation of sharecropping by verbal agreement like ly, asrental agreements would quickly establish tenant occupancy rights.The Kosi Kranti (revolution) project represented a response to this perception ofthe agrarian problem: it argued give security of tenure to the sharecropper andenable him to begin to benefit from the possibilities of more intensive cultivation.The project envisaged the organisation of the sharecroppers to come forward to berecorded as tenants, thus achieving security of tenure. The programme wasundertaken by a strengthened revenue administration under a specially deputedAdditional Collector in the six notoriously troubled blocks of the old DharmpurPargana. (A Pargana was an administrative unit for raising land taxes. See Franda2for a detailed account of the background and objectives of Kosi Kranti.)The obstacles to implementation are considerable. Attempts to registersharecroppers may lead to pre-emptive evictions as, to safeguard capital,landowners would accept the disruption and loss of current income. Anadministration sponsored drive to register sharecroppers would also have to face theenormous powers of obstruction which the law gives to the landlord. As previousmoves to enfranchise tenants have demonstrated, delaying tactics in the courts canhalt-and therefore effectively defeat-the move towards reform (Ladejinskyz5).An attempt to take away or restrict the recourse to law by landlords may provoke theuse of extra-legal methods of defending their interestsand the ensuing violence couldlead to the curta iling of reforming action. There can be litt le doubt, however, thatthis important pilot project wil l explore the limits of what is possible in terms ofredistribution within the existing political system. Insofar as the project achievessome gains in education (awareness of the possibilities of group action, when atpresent there is scarcely a literate scheduled caste or Santa1 labourer or sharecropperin North Bihar), a basis is created for future group action and the struggle for rights.(Other uplift activities, such as the Musahri Project in Muzzafarpur Distr ict(Frandai), are a beginning in making the landless and former sharecroppers awareof the possibilities for group action, quite apart from the success or failure of manyof the specific activities in the project.)

An objection to the focus on the tenure problem implic it in Ladejinskys work and


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 207Kosi Kranti is that this takes little account of the even worse plight of the landlessagricultural labourer. Whatever the limitation of existing data on land occupancy, itwould seem that more than 30 y0 of households in the Kosi region have no other landthan homesteads (Biggs and Burns4) and half of the population relies on agriculturallabour as its major source of income (Table 6). Tenurial reform, combined with an

TABLE 6COMPOSITION OF ECONOMICALLY ACTIVE POPULATION ACCORDING TO

OCCUPATION IN THE KOSI REGION 1961-19711961 1971 Per cent(OOas) (%I (000S) (%I change

CultivatorsAgriculturallabourersOthers

Total

1.001 50.6 909 43.7 -9.2605 30.6 960 46.1 +58,7373 18.8 213 10.2 - 42.9

1979 100.0 2082 100.0 +5.2Source: Adapt ed from 1971 Census return by Biggs and Burns.4

emphasis on support for the small farmer, wil l extend the economic opportunities ofmany who are in the middle deciles of the population in terms of income and assets.There is, however, a real possibility that the rapidly growing numbers of the landlesswil l be little benefited-and possibly made worse off-by the process of economicand social change.

CONCLUSIONS

The changes in the past decade in the Kosi region are perhaps slight when set againstthe expectations aroused by the Kosi project and the later sell ing of the GreenRevolution. Nevertheless, since the inception of the Kosi project, public investmentand the planned introduction of technical change, complemented by the localinnovation and adaptation of new technology described in this paper, have resultedin substantial economic growth. The successful exploitation of some technicalinnovations has depended on the emergence of new market relationships. The brutalbreaking of other institutional relationships is also occurring where this is in theeconomic interest of the innovator. Threshers and hullers and self cultivation (bymechanisation) imply a reduction in, or elimination of, activit ies critically importantto the landless and former sharecroppers.The Kosi region is on the move and, taking a longer historical perspective, thepace of transformation has been considerable. To focus only on the substantialconservative elements that sti ll exist within such a society and on the economicadvantages for landlords of maintaining exploitative relationships, such as bonded


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208 E. J. CLAYlabour, consumption loans and sharecropping, is to underestimate the longer termsignificance of the dynamic and aggressive rural capitalism that is slowlytransforming the region. Of course, where new technical possib ilities for increasingincomes are embodied in an inappropriate technique, the init ial outcome mayappear as the rejection of change and a sticking to old ways. But, as thedevelopments of the last decade in the Kosi region have shown, the more inventiveand far sighted, with the entrepreneurial talents to exploit the opportunities implic itin the new technology, wi ll adapt, experiment and innovate, and where they succeedothers wil l quickly follow. As few of the largest landowners are showing themselvesto be innovators and the 20th century equivalents of the Cokes (of Norfolk in GreatBritain) of an earlier agricultural revolution, the implementation of ceilinglegislation and tenure reform would probably both speed up the process of changeand spread the benefits of agricultural growth more widely. However, as the case ofmachine threshing indicates, this may be a growth strategy that will benefit half thepopulation little or at all and could be at their expense.The record on planned interventions to bring about this transformation is notonly mixed, but is difficult to quantify because of unreliable statistics. The actualimpact of the canal system, the full extent of the increase in production broughtabout by the spread of new varieties and crops, cannot be inferred with any certaintybecause of the inconsistencies and ambiguities of the data available. Thedistributional impact of the bamboo tubewell is sti ll a matter for largely optimisticspeculation. More recent developments in machine technology, such as the thresher,have not been documented.The changing land occupancy and tenurial situation or the extent of landlessnesscan only be inferred with caution from data of doubtful reliabi lity. Was there really amassive increase in the concentration of land between 195 1 and 196 1 and a reversalof this trend over the next decade? (Table 5). The statist ics may be more explicable interms of factors that b ias the returns, such as the fear of tenancy reform orimplementation of ceiling legislation, than in terms of real changes. There was alsoan apparent large increase in the numbers of agricultural labourers between 1961and 1971, whilst the labour force increased by a surpris ingly small 5.2 / Again,whilst other evidence confirms the reality of considerable landlessness in the region,have there been such large changes as are suggested by the statistics? The existingevidence is only sufficient to indicate the direction of change and the quantificationof the process of agricultural change and its economic and social repercussions mustawait future research.A major problem in appraising developments in the Kosi region is establishingexactly what has happened, in even the broadest terms, to technology and output,quite apart from determining the socio-economic impact of change. Additionalresources urgently need to be invested, not merely in problem diagnosis but also inmonitoring technical developments within the region. The role of monitoring inriver basin planning is developed further by Biggs7 This needs to be combined with a


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TECHNICAL INNOVATION AND PUBLIC POLICY 209flexible administrative capacity and a strong adaptive agricultural researchcapability to learn from-and to exploit-the opportunities indicated by thedirection of developments, which have been set in motion by major interventionssuch as the installation of an irrigation system and the introduction of newagricultural technology.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

S. D. Biggs, B. H. Farmer, B. B. Schaffer, G. R. Wood and the Editors of thisJournal have made helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper, but the viewsexpressed are solely the responsibility of the author. A travel grant from the BritishCouncil made possible the visi t to Bihar in 1979.

RE FE RE NCE S

123

45

6.

I.

8.

9.10.

11.12.

13.

14.

APPU, P. S., Unequal benefits from Kosi development, Economic and Political Weekly, 8 (16 June,1973).APPU, P. S., The bamboo tubewell, a low cost device for exploiting ground water: Economic andPolit ical Week/y, 8 (1973).B A DC (Banglades h Agric ultural Developm ent Corporation), HYV Tusk Force Reports, 1974-75and 1975-76, Dacca, 1976.BIGGS, S . D. & BURNS, C., The changing rural economy of north eastern India, Institute ofDevelopm ent Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton , UK, 1973. (Typescript).B E G S , S. D., The Kosi Area Development Project. In: The Kosi Symposium; The Rural Problem inNorth East Bihar: Analysis, Policy and Plan ning in the Kosi Area, (Joy, J. L. & Everett, E. (Eds)),1976.BIGGS, S . D. & BURNS, C. Transactions modes an d the distribution of farm output. In The KosiSymposium: The Rural Problem in North East Bihar: Analysis, Policy and Planning in the Kosi Area,(Jov. J. L. & Everett. E. (Eds). 1976.BIG& S. D., Monito ring for replann ing purposes: The role of R and D in river basin developm ent.Paper prepared for Seminar on River Basin Planning, May 1980. Centre for Development Studies,University Coll ege of Swansea; Wales, 1980.BOTTRALL, A., Common weaknesses in the planning, organisation and management of largeirrigation projects. Paper presented at the Pool-fact evaluatio n of a water resource project: Asvmnosium devoted to the study of the performance of the Kosi Proiect, Bihar Col lege ofBngm eering, Patna University, Patna, 22-25 January, 1979.BROWN, D. D.. Agricultura ldevelopm ent in Indias districts, Harvard U P, Cambr idge, Mass., 1971.CHI NNA P P A , B. N., Adopt ion of the new technology in the North Arrot District In: GreenRevolutio n? Technology and change in rice growing areas ofTami 1 Nadu andSri Lanka, (Farmer, B.H. (Ed.)). Macmillan. London. 1977.CLAY, g. J . , Innova&, inequality and rural planning: The economics of tubewell irrigation in theKosi region, Bihar, India, Unpubl ished PhD Thesis, University of Sussex, Brighton , 1974.CL A Y , E. J., Equity and productivity effects of a package of technical innovations and changes insocial institutions: Tubewells, tractors and high yieldi ng varieties. Indian Journal of Agricultura lEconomics. Vol. 30(4) (1975), pp. 75-87.CLAY , E. J. Choice of techniques: A case study of tubew ell irrigation. In: The Kosi Symposium :The Rural Problem in North East Bihar: Analysis, Policy and Planning in the Kosi Area, Soy, J. L. &Everett, E. (Eds), 1976,CL A Y , E. J., Ten years ofdwarfwheat production in Banglade sh, Banglad esh Journal of Agricultura lEconomics, l(1) (1978).


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21 0 E. J. CLAY15. CL A Y , E. J., CATLING, H. D. & HO B B S , P. R. Yields of deep-water rice in Banglade sh. Internation al

Rice Research Newsletter, 3(5) (1978) pp. 1 -12.16. CL A Y , E. J., The economics of the bamb oo tubewe ll, Ceres, 13(3) (1980) p.43-7.17. DA L RY M P L E , D. G., Developm ent and spread of high-yie lding varieties of wheat and rice in the lessdeveloped countries. Foreign Agricultur al Economic Report No. 95, US Department of AgricultureOffice of Cooperatio n and Developm ent, Washington, 1978.18. DASGUPTA, B . , Agrarian change and the new technology in India, Report No. 77.2, UNRISD,Geneva, 1977.19. DO M M E N, A. J., The bamboo tubewell: A note on an example of indigenous technology, EconomicDevelopm ent and Cultura l Change, 33(3) (1975).20. FRANDA, M., Agrarian reform in North Bihar: Operation Kosi Kranti, Amer ican Universities Field

Staff Reports 1978, No. 6, Asia, 1978.21. FRANDA, M. , JPs Musahri Project, 1978, American Universities Field Staff Reports 1978/No. 8 ,Asia, 1978.

22. GRIFFIN, K., The political economy of agrarian change, Macmillan, London, 1974.23. HOSKINS, M., Land-holding and development in the Kosi Area. In: The KosiSymposium: The RuralProble m in North East Bihar: Analysis, Policy and Plan ning in the Kosi Area. Joy, J. L. L Everett, E.

(Eds). 1976.24. joy, j , L. & EVER ETT, E. (Eds), The Kosi Symposium: The Rural Problem in North East Bihar:Analysis, Policy and Plan ning in the Kosi Area, Institute of Developm ent Studies, University ofSussex, Brighton , UK.

25. LADEJINSKY, W., The Green Revolution in Bihar-The Kosi Area: A field trip, Economic andPolit ical Weekly, 439) (27 Septem ber 1969).

26. PANT. N., Som e aspects of irrigation administr ation. (A case study of the Kosi Project), AN S SinhaInstitute of SocialStudies, Pama, 1979. . _

27. PRASA D, P . H. , Economic benefits of the Kosi Command Area, ANS Sinha Institute of Social Studies,Patna, 1972.28. Rev, A. K. & SINHA, S. Groundwater resources of Bihar with special reference to the problems ofplanning and development fo r irrigation purposes, Geologic al Survey of India, New Delhi , 1968.

29. SAR AN. S . & SAHAI . V. N. Chenab 64-117. a oromisin e deeu-water rice varietv for Bihar. India.Internation al Rice Research Newsletter, 3(5) (i978). W I30. SCH UH. G. E. & TOLLINI. H. Costs and benefits of agricultural research: The state of the art. StaffWorking Paper No. 360, World Bank, Washington, 1979.31. SINGH, R. P. Agricultura l transformation in Kosi Regio n, North Bihar, India, Department of Cityand Regi onal Pla nning , Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, Cambr idge, Mass. 1979(Mimeographed), 1978.

32. TAYLOR, D. C. & WICKHAM, T. H. Irrigation policy and the manag emen t of irrigation systems inSouth East Asia, Agricultural Developm ent Council, Inc. Bangkok, 1979.33. WEST BENGAL GOVERNMENT, Wheat, Calcutta, Directorate of Agriculture, 1975.34. WOOD, G. R., The legacy of the past-The agrarian structure. In: The Kosi Symposiu m: The RuralProble m in North East Bihar: Analysis, Policy and Plan ning in the Kosi Area. Joy, J. L. &Everett, E.

(Eds), 1976.

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