Persistence Pays

state-level data series on the quantity and quality of agricultural inputs and outputs, they offer a wealth of information on the institutions and functioning of the public agricultural research system, and they employ well-conceived models and state-of-the-art econometrics to tease out the effects of R&D expenditures on productivity growth. In the process they provide entirely new insights into myriad issues such as the extent of research spillovers, the nature of the lags in R&D investments, and the extent of the policy failures since the 1970s giving rise to a slowdown in farm productivity in the past10-20 years.-Alan L. Olmstead. Distinguished Research Professor, Department of Economics, University of California, Davis and co-author of Creating Abundance: Biological Innovation and American Agricultural Development, Cambridge University Press, 2008This book presents new solid empirical evidence about the past, current and required future role of research and innovations to prepare U.S. agriculture to meet future domestic and international food demand in a sustainable manner. The economic rates of return are high and spillovers across states are large. The authors make a strong and well-supported case for expanding federal funding for agricultural research. Global food demand is likely to double over the next 50 years. Given the long time lag between research investments and productivity gains, documented in this book, and the recent global food crisis, expanded investments are long overdue. Policy-makers, advisors and analysts should pay attention to the findings reported in this book and take appropriate action now to stop the current trend of decreasing rates of productivity growth.-Per Pinstrup-Andersen. H. E. Babcock Professor of Food, Nutrition and Public Policy, J. Thomas Clark Professor of Entrepreneurship, and Professor of Applied Economics at Cornell University; and Professor of Agricultural Economics at Copenhagen University. World Food Prize Laureate, 2001"The main purpose of this book is to provide a better understanding of the pattern of US agricultural productivity growth ... in the USA during the period from 1949 to 2002. ... this book is informative and provides a lot of details on the US agricultural sector for both productivity and research funding issues. This book can be treated as a reference book. ... it is not only for professionals, but could also be informative to policy makers as well as general readers." (Sun Ling Wang, European Review of Agricultural Economics, Vol. 37 (3), September, 2010)

multidimensional-they carefully construct new state-level data series on the quantity and quality of agricultural inputs and outputs, they offer a wealth of information on the institutions and functioning of the public agricultural research system, and they employ well-conceived models and state-of-the-art econometrics to tease out the effects of R&D expenditures on productivity growth. In the process they provide entirely new insights into myriad issues such as the extent of research spillovers, the nature of the lags in R&D investments, and the extent of the policy failures since the 1970s giving rise to a slowdown in farm productivity in the past10-20 years.

-Alan L. Olmstead. Distinguished Research Professor, Department of Economics, University of California, Davis and co-author of Creating Abundance: Biological Innovation and American Agricultural Development, Cambridge University Press, 2008

This book presents new solid empirical evidence about the past, current and required future role of research and innovations to prepare U.S. agriculture to meet future domestic and international food demand in a sustainable manner. The economic rates of return are high and spillovers across states are large. The authors make a strong and well-supported case for expanding federal funding for agricultural research. Global food demand is likely to double over the next 50 years. Given the long time lag between research investments and productivity gains, documented in this book, and the recent global food crisis, expanded investments are long overdue. Policy-makers, advisors and analysts should pay attention to the findings reported in this book and take appropriate action now to stop the current trend of decreasing rates of productivity growth.

-Per Pinstrup-Andersen. H. E. Babcock Professor of Food, Nutrition and Public Policy, J. Thomas Clark Professor of Entrepreneurship, and Professor of Applied Economics at CornellUniversity; and Professor of Agricultural Economics at Copenhagen University. World Food Prize Laureate, 2001

"The main purpose of this book is to provide a better understanding of the pattern of US agricultural productivity growth ... in the USA during the period from 1949 to 2002. ... this book is informative and provides a lot of details on the US agricultural sector for both productivity and research funding issues. This book can be treated as a reference book. ... it is not only for professionals, but could also be informative to policy makers as well as general readers." (Sun Ling Wang, European Review of Agricultural Economics, Vol. 37 (3), September, 2010)