I Fiance Apicultural

I1
TIhe issue of scale economies is vital to much of the analysis and is
pursued at length in this study. A particular effort was ,r.ade to quantify
the relationships through use of a cost fillictio that relates costs to scale
of operation, particularly at the branch level.
For studying other issues, some lilerature referenced used tabular
analysis; other references were based on econometric or prograuninitg
metliods. Further processing and analysis of data mainly relies on quotations
fioin existing literatutre and econoie tric and tabltlar methods.
Quotations are used because quantitative information is not available
and to Prther strengthen inferences drawn fiont the quantitative infor-
Iation that is available. Many of these quotations have been assembled
as a supplement to this report, available on request fiom the International
Food Policy Research Institute.
The broad methodological approach used here is cross-national
comparisons based ot boili crtoss-sectional-satit pIle and tiite-series data.
'l1e limitations of such coutipaiisons ate well known. They include
different initial conditions and stages of devehoptett of RFIs. To Ieducc
the stanidard ptolbltii of tiolicoti 1 ),arability that plagts closs-sectiomial
studies, solti classificaltiotis ate gtoutpl according to geograplical
regions and per capita rcal national itlcotlle gloulps. Cross-ulatiotial
coll iparisons (to provide a basis fo r j(Idging where thete is variation il
tile systems and whire thlrie tee lnd to be cleat central tendencies.
Because of major diffetetices in covetage ofti ICva'riouis sources, the
analysis of issues in various chapters does not include thc Salie corlltries.
For example, analysis of institutional finance in Chapters 3 and '4
covers a large 1u1luher of developed and developing countries, but this
is not the case ill other chapters. Similarly, Ille time spatis and sizes of
cross-sectional samples covered, eseially in the cliapters oti ltal loati
demand, nuttal deposits, an1d rural saving for various countries, lack
uniformity. For example, dalta oil tlese asf)ecls for a countmiy like the
United States cover a longer periodI, froin the teI 920s to tile 1960s.
But for other countries, I hey cover a shorter i)erio(il i tle 1960s to
19 7 0s or are one- or two-vear sitlveys of Closs-sectional houlsehiolds.
Lastly, data quality might not he tuifolin iti various studies under
review. These limitations are inevitalble because the literature oti which
the present study is based does not uniformly cover issues, nations,
sample sizes, and time spans.