Latin America and the Caribbean

This report presents a comprehensive analysis of public agricultural research and development (R&D) in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), focusing on the contextual factors influencing agricultural R&D investment and their implications for agricultural productivity growth. The analysis combines new data for ten LAC countries collected by the International Food Policy Research Institute's (IFPRI's) Agricultural Science and Technology Indicators (ASTI) program with support from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), with existing ASTI and other datasets.

Given the importance of agricultural R&D investment to sustain agricultural growth in the future, this study looks at the state of agricultural R&D investment in LAC, with the goal of identifying the level of underinvestment in the region. To do this the study uses a new indicator, the ASTI Intensity Index (AII) to measure agricultural R&D intensity in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and compares research intensity with that of other regions and between countries within the region.

Drawing from comprehensive datasets derived from primary surveys, this report reviews the major institutional developments and investment and human resource trends in public agricultural research and development (R&D) in the seven countries that constitute Central America: Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama.

Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) is well situated to scale up its agricultural production in the face of a growing global population and climate change. The region’s sources of comparative advantage lie, in part, in its abundant water and land resources. To succeed in generating the research outputs needed to accelerate agricultural growth, LAC countries need sufficient, sustainable funding for strategic agricultural research programs in alignment with national and regional priorities, combined with talented, well-trained researchers.

This study analyzes the performance of Latin America and the Caribbean's agriculture between 1980 and 2012 looking at the contribution of inputs, and total factor productivity (TFP) to growth in output per worker. A growth-accounting approach that goes along the lines of neoclassical growth accounting combined with Data Envelopment Analysis, allows us to measure TFP growth using output and input indices and also to decompose this growth into contributions of technical change and changes in technical efficiency.

Although the countries in Central America share many cultural and socioeconomic characteristics, important national differences of relevance to agricultural R&D exist  among them. In countries like Guatemala and El Salvador, agricultural R&D is largely undertaken by government agencies, whereas most of the research in Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica is conducted by higher education agencies. In addition, the nongovernmental sector—which includes producer organizations plays a significant role in carrying out agricultural R&D in Honduras and Costa Rica.