నైరూప్య

The Success of Industrialization Depends on the Prior Success of an Agricultural Transformation

Freda Manu*

The relationship between agriculture and industrialisation over the past years has been one of squeezing the former to expand the latter. Structural transformation, as key to economic growth and development, requires that labour and resources move from a 'low productivity' sector like agriculture to a 'high productivity' sector like industry. Thus, the quest for growth has led many developing countries to neglect their already weak agriculture sectors in pursuit of different kinds of industrialisation policies, from import substitution to export industrialisation with very little success for most of these countries. The result has been a rising food crisis and failing industrialisation efforts in many parts of the Third World.