This book is concerned with the difficulties faced by farmers in Afro-Asia and Latin America in attempting to increase their agriucltural productivity. The first part deals with the economic and social obstacles to agricultural development and considers some policies for overcoming them.In the second part the attention is focused on the physical environment of the developing world and the agronomic problems that the farmers face.

Four major ecological regions are defined: the arid lands, the humid tropics, the savannas and the monsoon world. For each region the salient features of the environment which are relevant to the agriculture are analysed, the major types of farming reviewed and the technical problems in increasing farming productivity are discussed. A list of tables contributes to the clarification of : farm structures, world land use, world water use, major arable lands, estimates of potential arable land, arable land by regions, distribution of population in the arid zone, arable land in the humid tropics, annual run-off and major river systems etc.