[whb07]

That doesn’t address the core issue of rule of law and property rights though. Pick any number of countries in Africa and air drop them ag-tech that’s 50 years into the future. I don’t for a second believe that it would cause much of anything to change or improve.

Your US example appears to have been constrained by the current tech and knowledge of the day. In Kenya like you bring up, they aren’t limited by those things but rather lack of rule of law and property rights. So how can you compare them apples to apples?

This isn’t a chicken or egg thing. Rule of law and property rights are the necessary condition to allow people and society to grow and flourish. You can’t skip those necessary steps.

I mean look at the agricultural output for Zimbabwe for reference.

[estsauver]

Hey, I'm sorry but I truly don't understand what you're trying to say. I want to try and understand where we disagree, because to me that usually indicates we're having a communication failure. I think this is an empirical question and I feel like it's been settled at every level, and so I'd like to understand at what level we're disagreeing.

Things I believe:

- At the plant level, crop science has shown fertilizer and seed breeding are by far the dominant factor that control the first 75% of yield above wild types of maize/corn.

- One Acre Fund RCTs have shown that providing seed and fertilizer substantially improve yield outcomes.

- At the macro level, the development path of most countries that have transitioned out of agricultural economies have correlated extremely well with fertilizer usage. From the US to China, yield correlates really, really well with fertilizer usage and minimally with things like rule of law indexes of property ownership.

Which level or statement do we disagree at?