Abstract
Rice farming in the Philippines underwent an unprecedented change in the 1970s-a result of technological innovations combined with a new high-yielding variety of rice. This paper attempts to shed light on the basic nature and pattern of this agrarian change as well as to discuss its implications. Accordingly, attention is given to the basic components of current technological innovation, namely, seeds, inputs, credit.
The patterns of agrarian change identified in this study are: firstly, the specialization of seed production, in other words, the alienation of farmers from seed production; secondly, the growing dependence of farmers on modern inputs; and, thirdly, the great expansion of the farm credit system in the rural community.
It should be emphasized that, contrary to the frequent claims of the development economists, the tremendous expansion of the domestic market for farm inputs failed to encourage the growth of domestic agro-industries. Instead, au enormous impact was observed only in the marketing and financing sectors. This brought about the emergence of a commercial elite class in the rural community.
Another point is that the massive diffusion of “green revolution” technology in the 1970s brought the country to self-sufficiency in rice. This resulted, on the one hand, in termination of rice imports from neighboring countries, but, on the other, it created a new dependence on the foreign capital necessary to acquire modern inputs.
