BACKGROUND AND QUESTIONS
In the Indian state of West Bengal many farmers work as
sharecroppers (bargadars in the Bengali language), renting land
from landowners in exchange for a share of the crop.
The traditional contractual arrangements throughout this
state varied little from village to village, with virtually all
bargadars giving half their crop to the landowner at harvest time.
This had been the norm since at least the eighteenth century.
However, because of the extreme levels of deprivation among the
bargadars many thought this was unfair. In 1973, 73% of the rural
population lived in poverty, one of the highest poverty rates in
India. In 1978, the newly elected Left Front government of West
Bengal adopted new laws, called Operation Barga.
The new laws stated that:
• Bargadars could keep up to three-quarters of their crop.
• Bargadars were protected from eviction by landowners,
provided they paid them the 25% quota.
Both provisions of Operation Barga were advocated as a way of
increasing overall output and the incomes of the farmers. Indeed,
Operation Barga was subsequently cited by the World Bank as an
example of good policy for economic development. One study
suggested that Operation Barga was responsible for around 28% of
the subsequent growth in agricultural productivity in the region.
The empowerment of the bargadars also had positive spillover
effects as local governments became more responsive to the needs of
poor farmers.
Q1 Use your knowledge of economic incentives to explain the
possible reasons for the success of Operation Barga in increasing
overall output of the region and the incomes of the farmers. (3
marks)
Q2 From a consequentialist perspective, was the introduction
of Operation Barga ethically justified? (6 marks)
Q3 Using a deontological ethical framework, construct an
argument either in favour of
Operation Barga or against it. (6 marks)
Q4 Did the introduction of Operation Barga result in a Pareto
improvement in allocations between the farmers and landowners?
Explain your answer. (3 marks)
Q5 What can Pareto efficiency tell us about the fairness and
equality of allocations? When discussing your answer be sure to
reference the specific case of Operation Barga. (4 marks)
You are now asked to model the trade-off between free time
and production for an independent farmer named Mamata who owns the
land on which she works.
If Mamata was able to work 24 hours a day she could produce 4
tonnes of rice (the principal food crop cultivated in West Bengal)
each day. You are told that Mamata’s utilitymaximising choice is to
work for 8 hours and produce 3 tonnes of rice.
Q6 Use the model of decision-making under scarcity developed
in week 3 to show Mamata’s optimal choice of free time and rice
production. On this diagram be sure to label and define her
feasible frontier, set of indifference curves and optimal choice.
(5 marks)
Now you are informed that Mamata is no longer an independent
farmer. Instead, she works as a bargadar and rents the land on
which she works from a landowner in exchange for a 75% share of the
rice that she produces (as is the case after the adoption of
Operation Barga).
Q7 Using your answer to Q6 as a starting point, show (on a
separate model) Mamata’s new optimal choice as a sharecropper.
Again, be sure to label and define each of the relevant points and
lines on your diagram. List each of the assumptions you made when
developing your model. (8 marks)
Q8 Discuss how the models developed in Q6 and Q7 can be used
by economists to evaluate the fairness of economic outcomes? (5
marks)
Sample Solution
Other samples, services and questions:
When you use PaperHelp, you save one valuable — TIME
You can spend it for more important things than paper writing.
