Food security, harvest shocks, and the potato as secondary crop in Saxony, 1792-1811

Grünebaum, Tim and Martin Uebele

No GD-139, GGDC Research Memorandum from Groningen Growth and Development Centre, University of Groningen

Abstract: This article has two aims: First, it is a contribution to development economics, in particular to the literature about food risk in rural economies. We contribute by emphasizing crop diversification as a means of reducing the variance of household food production, and by providing empirical evidence for the success of this strategy in a historical setting. Second, the article contributes to economic history by addressing the relationship between early industrialisation and agrarian change. We interpret the structure of agricultural production in the context of a low energy-high labour input proto-industrial equilibrium, where household production of a diversified food bundle represents an effective way to fight food risk. This should be seen in line with a literature highlighting endogenous adjustment of agricultural production to demand shifts from the non-agricultural sectors (Grantham 1989, Kopsidis and Wolf 2012).

Date: 2013
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