Masters Theses

Tej Narain

Date of Award

12-1956

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Major

Agricultural Economics

Major Professor

Eldon D. Smith

Committee Members

D. M. Thorpe, A. W. Woodard

Abstract

This thesis will explore the role of agricultural marketing in economic development. Historically, it will be shown how agricultural marketing has played an important role in improving economic well-being. To demonstrate these phenomena, the part played by agricultural marketing during the primitive days, the influence it had on the economy of the Middle Ages, its contribution to economic development during the colonial period, and the main characteristics of this activity that led to the development of the United States will be brought to the reader's attention.

However, historically, with the depression of the 1930's, it will be shown that events tended to obscure the influence of agricultural marketing on economic development. The obvious causes, as we shall see, were stagnation and focus on investment and recovery. At that period of time, the state of theory in marketing reflected a dissociation from development and was pointed more to problems of efficiency, allocation of resources, and distribution of income.

The question that has now become significant is whether or not improvements in marketing are really strategic to economic development in the low-income areas of the United States and in the underdeveloped countries of the world. Thus we seek to find if various processes of agricultural marketing are proper and necessary to assist development. If we conclude that improvements in agricultural marketing are necessary, the issue then is, can the current theory used in marketing be considered adequate to the analysis of development problems in the marketing field?

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