AN AGROECONOMIC LAND RESOURCE ASSESSMENT FOR RICE PRODUCTION IN THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC.

摘要

The Dominican Republic has been importing increasing quantities of rice since 1972. In 1978 the government began a program to increase domestic rice production in order to reduce foreign exchange expenditures and to increase employment. As a sub-component of that program, this study was undertaken to assess the agronomic and physical ("agrophysical") and economic ("agroeconomic") feasibility of rice production expansion in each land unit ("GDSS") in the Central Region of the country. The regional study was to serve as a prototype for a national rice land use assessment and for studies of other agricultural land uses.;Conclusions drawn from the study can be divided into policy and methodological conclusions. There are two major policy conclusions. First, irrigated GDSSs 06A and 07A and rainfed 20B have the best prospects for rice area expansion. A 25,000 ta expansion of rice production in those GDSSs under strategy E (maximization of rice monetary returns with free choice of production technique and GDSS) would increase annual labor use by 2.4 million hr and increase brown rice production by 4.4 million qq. The country could save ;There are three major methodological conclusions. First, the study methods seem to be appropriate to the current Dominican planning environment. However, the secondary and judgmental data sources used in the study should be supplemented by land use surveys at the farm level. Second, several of the critical assumptions made in the study should be given more detailed study prior to use in project planning. Third, other intra- and inter-sectoral production and consumption information in addition to this land use assessment should be incorporated in the rice expansion policymaking process in order to increase the probability that a feasible and desirable expansion policy and resulting projects can be planned and implemented.;The analysis was of two types. First, an agrophysical analysis of the land base was carried out in order to identify areas with potential for increased rice production. Rice plant tolerance limits for potentially limiting soil and water characteristics were estimated and cross-tabulated with the corresponding GDSS characteristics. Second, an economic analysis was made of the GDSSs selected in the agrophysical analysis. Benefits and costs of the production of rice and of its two principal competitors for land in the Central Region (sugarcane and cultivated pasture used for milk production) were analyzed from the producer cash expense ("monetary") and the national opportunity ("unsubsidized") points of view. A typical current set of rice production techniques and an alternative set requiring increased labor and/or decreased foreign exchange used were analyzed. The benefit-cost results were used in partial budgeting of a hypothetical 25,000 ta expansion of rice production area using 11 alternative strategies. The strategies consisted of various assumptions on expansion decision rules (maximization of rice production, maximization of rice monetary and unsubsidized returns to land and management, maximization of rice production labor use, and minimization of rice production foreign exchange use) and policy variables (rice production techniques, number of rice production cycles per year, and expansion in current or potentially available GDSSs).