An Economic Assessment of Banana Genetic Improvement and ...

8 CHAPTER 1
niques (based on seed production by either
self-pollination, cross-pollination, or by hybridization)
makes genetic engineering a
particularly attractive means of combating
pests and disease through host-plant resistance
(see Chapter 4 and Johanson and Ives
2001). In addition, even when breeders
choose parents preferred by farmers, the
development of hybrids through conventional
crosses often produces bananas that
are distant in type from either parent. Thus,
biotechnology offers a means of genetic
improvement without transforming the end
products that have proven to be of economic
value to farmers and consumers. So far, genetic
transformation for fungal resistance
has been initiated in Cavendish and plantain
types only but has been recommended for
endemic types (Quemada and Johanson
2004). Farmers reproduce banana cultivars
through vegetative propagation.
Contribution of This
Research
This study contributes information in several
ways. First, it provides a case study of
the potential impacts of a food-crop biotechnology
in smallholder African agriculture.
From case studies published about the
adoption of crop biotechnologies so far, relatively
little can be gleaned about the potential
demand for transgenic cultivars of staple
food crops in Sub-Saharan Africa. Several
ex ante studies predicting the economic
impact of transgenic food crops have been
conducted in the economic surplus framework
(Qaim 1999a,b), based on assumed,
rather than actual, adoption parameters.
Farmer adoption of genetically improved
cultivars has been analyzed ex post in highincome
countries with fully commercialized
agricultural production, based on field
trials, farmer and consultant surveys, or
field-level surveys (reviewed in Fernandez-
Conejo and McBride 2002; Marra, Pardey,
and Alston 2003).
Few biotechnology products have been
released to farmers in agricultural economies
that are not heavily industrialized.
Recent research has analyzed the adoption
and welfare impacts ex post of introducing
transgenic cotton in China, South Africa,
Mexico, Argentina, and India (see review
by Smale, Zambrano, and Cartel 2006).
Cotton, the championed success story in
developing countries, is a special case. Cottonseed
cannot be easily saved by smallholder
farmers, and the requirements of
ginning and delinting processes favor the
vertical integration of cotton production and
marketing. The story of Makhathini Flats of
Kwa Zulu, Natal, illustrates the vulnerability
of growers to such market arrangements
(Gouse et al. 2005).
A second contribution of this research is
the representative statistical baseline that it
provides to national research programs for
characterizing banana growers and bananas
today and measuring the effects of projects
in the future. A third is the integration of
several in-depth studies, undertaken principally
as doctoral theses (Edmeades 2003;
Katungi 2006; Bagamba 2007; Nkuba
2007), which investigate specific components
of banana production and types of
banana cultivars and management practices.
The principal objectives of these theses
were to analyze
1. constraints to banana productivity and
efficiency, including labor markets and
soil fertility;
2. banana cultivar choice and demand
with a trait-based approach, accounting
for farmers’ perceptions of biotic
constraints and cooking quality;
3. the role of social capital and social
networks in diffusion of best practices
for soil fertility management in banana
production; and
4. the effects of banana hybrids on smallholder
farmers in the Kagera Region
of Tanzania.
Drawing on the findings of these theses
permitted a more comprehensive understanding
of farmers’ conditions. Viewing
technology as a gradation of practices and