Small scale food processing can create diversified incomes and employement for farmers in rural villages. Processing brings many differenet benefits to communities: it allows foods to be preserved and stored as a reserve against times of shortage, it helps to avoid the effects of lowered prices when seasonal gluts occur at harvest time, it creates special foods for cultural idenity and it enables farmers to add value to crops and animal products that diversify and increase sources of income.
This book documents frontier knowledge on the drivers of agriculture productivity to derive pragmatic policy advice for governments and development partners on reducing poverty and boosting shared prosperity. The analysis describes global trends and long-term sources of total factor productivity growth, along with broad trends in partial factor productivity for land and labor, revisiting the question of scale economies in farming. Technology is central to growth in agricultural productivity, yet across many parts of the developing world, readily available technology is never taken up. We investigate demand-side constraints of the technology equation to analyze factors that might influence producers, particularly poor producers, to adopt modern technology. Agriculture and food systems are rapidly transforming, characterized by shifting food preferences, the rise and growing sophistication of value chains, the increasing globalization of agriculture, and the expanding role of the public and private sectors in bringing about efficient and more rapid productivity growth. In light of this transformation, the analysis focuses on the supply side of the technology equation, exploring how the enabling environment and regulations related to trade and intellectual property rights stimulate Research and Development to raise productivity. The book also discusses emerging developments in modern value chains that contribute to rising productivity. This book is the fourth volume of the World Bank Productivity Project, which seeks to bring frontier thinking on the measurement and determinants of productivity to global policy makers.
Manufacturing’s central role in global innovation Companies compete on the decisions they make. For years—even decades—in response to intensifying global competition, companies decided to outsource their manufacturing operations in order to reduce costs. But we are now seeing the alarming long-term effect of those choices: in many cases, once manufacturing capabilities go away, so does much of the ability to innovate and compete. Manufacturing, it turns out, really matters in an innovation-driven economy. In Producing Prosperity, Harvard Business School professors Gary Pisano and Willy Shih show the disastrous consequences of years of poor sourcing decisions and underinvestment in manufacturing capabilities. They reveal how today’s undervalued manufacturing operations often hold the seeds of tomorrow’s innovative new products, arguing that companies must reinvest in new product and process development in the US industrial sector. Only by reviving this “industrial commons” can the world’s largest economy build the expertise and manufacturing muscle to regain competitive advantage. America needs a manufacturing renaissance—for restoring itself, and for the global economy as a whole. This will require major changes. Pisano and Shih show how company-level choices are key to the sustained success of industries and economies, and they provide business leaders with a framework for understanding the links between manufacturing and innovation that will enable them to make better outsourcing decisions. They also detail how government must change its support of basic and applied scientific research, and promote collaboration between business and academia. For executives, policymakers, academics, and innovators alike, Producing Prosperity provides the clearest and most compelling account yet of how the American economy lost its competitive edge—and how to get it back.
The substantial prosperity that characterizes market economies at the beginning of the twenty-first century is relatively recent in human history. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, economic progress was so slow that people would not have been able to recognize it in their lifetimes, whereas today, economic progress is so much a part of people’s lives that they take it for granted. In this new volume, Randall G. Holcombe argues that economic analysis, as it developed through the twentieth century, relies heavily on concepts of economic equilibrium, and is not descriptive of the dynamic real-world economy that is characterized by economic progress. Even in dynamic settings, economic models focus on income growth, leaving out the entrepreneurial forces that generate economic progress, resulting in the introduction of new goods and services and new production processes. Economic analysis focuses on the forces that lead to an economic equilibrium, not the forces that produce prosperity. This characterization of economic analysis describes a substantial component of economics as it has developed over the past century. However, there are also economists who have analyzed the factors that lead to an entrepreneurial and innovative economy, generating progress rather than equilibrium. This volume does not question the value of past research, but argues that, looking ahead, economics should build on its past to focus on factors that create an entrepreneurial and innovative economy that is characterized by progress and prosperity. This would make economic analysis more consistent with the remarkable progress and prosperity that characterizes the modern economy. This volume lays out a framework for economic analysis that consistently incorporates the real-world factors that produce prosperity.
The Forty-Day Prosperity Process will help the believer to walk in the next level of God's will when it comes to financial security. This is the same God that provided for Israel in the wilderness for forty years, who took them from supplying them their daily provision (Deut. 8:3) to a land that flowed with milk and honey (Deut. 8:18-19). God took them through a process back then; why should he not do the same thing for us today? The process brings stability and balance to the believer's life. We, like the children of Israel, should not accept poverty or lack; we will remember that it is God who gives us the power to get wealth (Deut. 8:18).
Clayton M. Christensen, the author of such business classics as The Innovator’s Dilemma and the New York Times bestseller How Will You Measure Your Life, and co-authors Efosa Ojomo and Karen Dillon reveal why so many investments in economic development fail to generate sustainable prosperity, and offers a groundbreaking solution for true and lasting change. Global poverty is one of the world’s most vexing problems. For decades, we’ve assumed smart, well-intentioned people will eventually be able to change the economic trajectory of poor countries. From education to healthcare, infrastructure to eradicating corruption, too many solutions rely on trial and error. Essentially, the plan is often to identify areas that need help, flood them with resources, and hope to see change over time. But hope is not an effective strategy. Clayton M. Christensen and his co-authors reveal a paradox at the heart of our approach to solving poverty. While noble, our current solutions are not producing consistent results, and in some cases, have exacerbated the problem. At least twenty countries that have received billions of dollars’ worth of aid are poorer now. Applying the rigorous and theory-driven analysis he is known for, Christensen suggests a better way. The right kind of innovation not only builds companies—but also builds countries. The Prosperity Paradox identifies the limits of common economic development models, which tend to be top-down efforts, and offers a new framework for economic growth based on entrepreneurship and market-creating innovation. Christensen, Ojomo, and Dillon use successful examples from America’s own economic development, including Ford, Eastman Kodak, and Singer Sewing Machines, and shows how similar models have worked in other regions such as Japan, South Korea, Nigeria, Rwanda, India, Argentina, and Mexico. The ideas in this book will help companies desperate for real, long-term growth see actual, sustainable progress where they’ve failed before. But The Prosperity Paradox is more than a business book; it is a call to action for anyone who wants a fresh take for making the world a better and more prosperous place.
In her latest book, author and intuitive consultant Lynn A. Robinson lights the path to prosperity by showing her readers how to access their true dreams and passions and how to tap into their personal wells of abundance. Refreshingly down to earth and rich with humor, compassion, and compelling tales of success, Real Prosperity points its readers to financial and spiritual prosperity with sage advice, true stories, inspirational quotes, and quick, practical exercises that add a valuable "how to" factor not often found in this genre. At a time when Americans are sinking into a quagmire of debt and the deeper meaning of life seems to elude even the well off, this wonderful new book offers relief and promises to help its readers chart a course to a richer, more abundant life. This is not a get-rich-quick or pray-your-way-to-wealth book. Nor is it a book about financial planning and debt reduction. It is, instead, an inspiring and uplifting guide that delivers hope, not hype; workable lessons, not foolish philosophy. In other words, it's a book that can work magic in your life. Read it and you'll agree.
DigiCat presents to you this unique collection of the best advices taken from modern guidance books and ancient wisdom. This meticulously edited self-help collection contains carefully picked out books about reaching financial success as well as personal peace and spiritual development. Table of Contents: Wallace D. Wattles: The Science of Getting Rich The Science of Being Well How to Get What You Want William Walker Atkinson: The Secret of Success Thought-Force in Business and Everyday Life The Power of Concentration P. T. Barnum: The Art of Money Getting The Humbugs of the World Benjamin Franklin: The Autobiography The Way to Wealth Orison Swett Marden: Architects of Fate He Can Who Thinks He Can, and Other Papers on Success in Life How To Succeed Prosperity – How to attract it James Allen: From Poverty to Power As a Man Thinketh Eight Pillars of Prosperity Foundation Stones to Happiness and Success Russell Conwell: Acres of Diamonds The Key to Success What You Can Do With Your Will Power Praying for Money Henry Harrison Brown: Dollars Want Me (Twin Editions) Thorstein Veblen: The Theory of Business Enterprise Émile Cou: Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion Kahlil Gibran: The Prophet Marcus Aurelius: Meditations Niccolò Machiavelli: The Prince Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching B. F. Austin: How to Make Money Charles F. Haanel: The Master Key System Robert Collier: The Secret of the Ages Riches Within Your Reach Elbert Hubbard: A Message to Garcia William Crosbie Hunter: Dollars and Sense Harry A. Lewis: Hidden Treasures; Or, Why Some Succeed While Others Fail Florence Scovel Shinn: The Game of Life and How to Play It Napoleon Hill: Think and Grow Rich George Matthew Adams: You Can Genevieve Behrend: Your Invisible Power Elizabeth Towne: The Life Power and How to Use It Ralph Waldo Trine: In Tune with the Infinite Charles Fillmore: Prosperity George S. Clason: The Richest Man in Babylon
Just being good at what you do doesn’t cut it anymore. Today’s information fueled economy rewards a new breed of worker—those who can think differently, move faster, and attain a level of knowledge that tilts the field of play in their favor. In Shortcut to Prosperity, Mark Hopkins explains how to develop those habits—not only for career success, but also for a more fulfilling and exciting life. He’ll show you how to • Do the soul searching required to find your passion • Harness hardship or personal vision to engage a lifelong Prosperity Cycle that builds on one success after another • Put in the hours with the right organizations to develop a differentiating level of competence • Exploit your natural curiosity and expand your field of vision to spot opportunities others miss, the most important entrepreneurial habit • Develop partners, guides, and mentors to help you along the way However you define prosperity, Mark can help you find your field of play, develop a competitive advantage, and recruit allies. Through stories of inspiring people—some entrepreneurs, some not—Mark reinforces the book’s message: you don’t have to be a genius or lucky to have the exact career and life you want. By sharing the habits of success and simple strategies for integrating them into your life, Mark will help you map your own shortcut to prosperity.
