Pesticides and Agriculture Profit, Politics and Policy

Pesticides have played a critical but sometimes controversial role in the development of agriculture. This book provides an authoritative account of the development of the modern pesticides industry. It discusses the emergence of major pesticide companies such as Bayer, Monsanto, Rhone Poulenc, Dow, DuPont, Ciba-Geigy, Syngenta, BASF and ICI. It covers their competitive strategies such as product development, mergers/acquisitions and diversification. Individual company strategies are placed in the context of broader developments in agriculture which have driven the evolution of the industry, from the Pre-Productionist period to the contemporary world of Post-Productivism and the Sustainability Paradigm. It also reviews how companies have responded to changing national and international policy towards the role of pesticides in agriculture and efforts to regulate their use. This book will be a standard reference on understanding the growth structure, dynamics and major players in a hugely-important and influential sector in global agriculture. It will appeal to a wide range of readers, from policy makers and researchers in crop protection to financial and investment analysts focussed on agriculture, and to all those interested in the development and future of modern agriculture. Dr Dave Watson is a leading authority on sustainable development and optimising value chains in agriculture. He has taught courses on sustainable development for the University of Hull (UK), as well as managing research and development programmes for the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI), the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) and the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT) in Mexico. Dr Watson is editor of the two-volume Achieving sustainable cultivation of maize, also published by Burleigh Dodds Science Publishing.