Innovations in Agriculture
Annotatsiya
This chapter explores how farm technologies are developed and how they reach farmers. Farmers obtain seeds in one or more of four different ways. They may obtain seed freely through sharing with other farmers; purchase from seed companies with no restrictions on their future propagation; purchase seed of varieties suitable for only one crop-production cycle; and/or purchase with formal agreement that limits use to a single crop-production cycle. The ability to patent plant varieties combined with the development of advanced plant genetics led to considerable consolidation of the seed-supply industry. The chapter then looks at how domination of the seed-supply for the major crops by just a few large companies has led to concerns about limited genetic diversity among the major crops, and debate about who actually owns plant varieties. It considers how agricultural technologies and practices are subject to oversight and regulation.