July 1999 - June 2001
Douglas Gollin, Ph.D.
Dr. Douglas Gollin, who was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics at WIlliams College in Williamstown, Massachusetts, was nominated by Professor Robert Evenson from Yale's Department of Economics. Dr. Gollin began his two-year Donnelley Environmental Fellowship in August 1999 working with Professor Evenson on the use value of biodiversity.
Research Progress Report
Gaylord Donnelley Environmental Fellowship
January 2001
Agricultural development, economic growth, and sustainable resource use.
Submitted by: Dr. Douglas Gollin
Yale Faculty Sponsor: Professor Robert Evenson,
Yale Economic Growth Center
January 2001
Over
the past year, several research projects have come
to fruition. Most notably, Dr. Gollin expects to
complete a book manuscript edited jointly with
Yale Economics Professor Robert E. Evenson in
January 2001. This manuscript summarizes the
results of a two-year effort by a group of
economists from around the world to examine the
impact of international agricultural research on
the sustainable production of crops. Their
findings have been presented at the World Bank and
in numerous other forums, and it is anticipated
that the book itself will receive considerable
attention within the international community.
A major finding of this research is the
overwhelming success of international research in
developing improved crop varieties over the past
40 years. These varieties have played a
substantial and important role in contributing to
unprecedented increases in per capita availability
of food. They have also helped to alleviate
stress on land and forest resources by allowing
for increased human populations to be fed at least
partly through intensification of agriculture on
existing crop land, rather than through clearing
of new land.
It
is believed that this work will play a significant
role in shaping attitudes within the international
policy community. The study was commissioned
by the Technical Advisory Committee of the
Consultative Group on International Agricultural
Research (CGIAR), the umbrella organization that
supports some 16 international agricultural
research centers. The study comes at a time
when donors have been reluctant to allocate funds
for further agricultural research, at least in
part based on some misconceptions about the
continued impacts of such work.
Drawing
on this research, Professor Evenson and Dr. Gollin
are organizing a session at this year’s annual
meetings of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science (AAAS). This session
will address the appropriate role for the public
sector in the further development of biotechnology
for agriculture. In addition to organizing
the session, they are also preparing one of the
papers, which Dr. Gollin will present. The
main message of the paper is that public sector
research will remain the predominant source of
technical change for agriculture in developing
countries. For most major crops, we see
little evidence that the private sector will carry
out much research relevant to the needs of poor
countries.
Another
accomplishment during the past year was the
publication of a paper on the management of
materials in agricultural gene banks. For
most cultivated crops, genetic diversity
is collected and conserved ex situ in gene banks
– typically cold storage facilities designed to
maintain the viability of seeds for 50 to 100
years. Along with colleagues from CIMMYT,
the International Center for Maize and Wheat
Improvement in Mexico, Dr. Gollin wrote a paper
that addressed some practical questions relating
to the use of gene banks for breeding improved
varieties. This paper, recently published in
the American Journal of Agricultural Economics,
has been well received by plant breeders and gene
bank managers, as well as by economists.
Dr.
Gollin has also continued to explore theoretical
models of the relationship between agricultural
development and economic growth. Along with
several colleagues at Yale and elsewhere, he is
working on papers that focus on the theoretical
and empirical relationships between technical
change in agriculture and economic growth.
Outside
of his research, he has taken advantage of many
intellectual resources at Yale and has enjoyed the
chance to interact with students and faculty in
the Economics Department, the School of Forestry
and Environmental Studies, and the Yale Center for
International and Area Studies. His
experience at Yale has been both productive and
enjoyable and he thanks the Donnelley family and
the Yale Institute for Biospheric Studies for
their kind and generous support.
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