Hybrid Corn in the United States, 1900–35

Dominic Hogg
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Dominic Hogg: ECOTEC Research and Consultancy

Chapter 5 in Technological Change in Agriculture, 2000, pp 145-174 from Palgrave Macmillan

Abstract: Abstract The development of hybrid maize caused dramatic changes both on and off the farm. It both assisted, and took place against a background of, the professionalisation of plant breeding. Breeding was taken out of the hands of farmers, and became the exclusive domain of new specialists, whose expertise was founded on the application of new insights into the mechanism of heredity. Despite the euphoria with which hybrid maize was greeted, especially following its widespread adoption, change was a long time in arriving. Whilst the key theoretical work had been all but completed by the end of the first decade of the twentieth century, it would be twenty years before hybrids would be planted on significant acreages in the Corn Belt. Once this point was reached, however, the change was swift, though the rapidity of this change was not due solely to the alleged superiority of hybrids in the field.

Keywords: Technological Change; Recurrent Selection; Hybrid Maize; Seed Company; Corn Yield (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2000
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:palchp:978-0-333-98125-2_6

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DOI: 10.1057/9780333981252_6

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