Analyse des besoins en mécanisation agricole basée sur les logiques paysannes dans les pôles de développement agricole du Bénin

L’agriculture béninoise est tributaire depuis plusieurs années de l’utilisation des outils rudimentaires malgré les efforts consentis par les gouvernants successifs. L’étude a été basée sur une approche participative aux fins d’identifier de concert avec les producteurs et transformateurs, les besoins en mécanisation agricole pré et post-récolte. Elle a été conduite à l’aide d’un guide d’entretien semi-structuré auprès de 129 producteurs et 66 transformateurs au niveau de 13 villages au Bénin. Les résultats ont montré que malgré leur satisfaction, les utilisateurs des matériels et équipements agricoles ont exprimé des besoins pour un renforcement de la mécanisation agricole. Ainsi, les principales opérations pré-récolte à mécaniser étaient la préparation du sol, le labour, l’herbicidage, le désherbage/sarclage et la récolte. Pour les opérations post-récolte, les besoins en équipements concernaient le décorticage/égrenage, l’épluchage, le battage/despathage, le broyage, le pressage et le conditionnement/emballage. Par ailleurs, les prototypes des outils préférés par les producteurs/transformateurs devraient présenter une puissance élevée et être capables de réduire le taux de perte puis d’améliorer la qualité du produit. A cela, doivent s’ajouter le temps de travail par jour avoisinant 5 h, une durée d’amortissement de huit ans et deux opérateurs au plus pour leur fonctionnement.Mots clés : Bénin, opérations pré et post récoltes, préférences, représentation sociale. English Title: Analysis of farming mechanization needs based on the logics of farmers in the Benin agricultural development poles Since years, Benin agriculture has been relying on the utilization of rudimentary equipment despite the efforts made by successive governments. This study was based on a participatory approach to identify with producers and processors, the needs for agricultural mechanization pre- and post-harvest. For this purpose, the study was conducted using a semi-structured interview guide with 129 producers and 66 processors distributed accross thirteen (13) villages of Benin. The results obtained show that despite their satisfaction, the users of agricultural machinery have expressed needs for an enhacement of agricultural mechanization. Thus, the main pre-harvest operations to be mechanized were soil preparation, plowing, herbicidage, weeding / weeding and harvesting. For post-harvest operations, equipment needs include shelling / ginning, peeling, threshing / shucking, grinding, pressing and packing. However, the agricultural equipment and materials desired by the producers and processors must have a high power and a capacity to reduce the rate of loss and improvement of the quality of the final product. Additionally, an average working time of about five (5) hours, an average replacement period of eight (8) years and two (2) operators at most for their functioning.Keywords: Benin, pre and post harvest operations, préférences, social representation.

Political Accountability, Legislator Gender, and the Status Quo Bias

A large body of literature in political science documents differences between elected men and women in their substantive policy preferences, representation styles, and effectiveness as legislators. We know far less about whether female and male representatives respond differently to being held politically accountable for their decisions. Although it is a difficult concept to evaluate empirically with incumbents, this absence of research is nevertheless surprising considering the central role of accountability in legislative behavior and the nonelite evidence that women and men respond differently to attributions of accountability. I provide evidence for the existence of such an accountability gender gap in an experiment with 377 incumbent legislators in three countries, in which they were asked to choose between economic policy plans alternately presented as the status quo, with varying levels of implied task accountability. Elected women and men reacted significantly differently when the political accountability levels of the task increased: female politicians exhibited a stronger preference for policies presented as the status quo, whereas male politicians were more likely to abandon the status quo and favor change. This pattern is unique to politicians and is not observed in nonelites. I discuss processes that motivate this divergence and the implications for research on gender and political representation.

Perspective, sources and methodology in a comparative study of the middle class in nineteenth-century Leicester and Peterborough

Social history, and urban history in particular, has become increasingly concerned, in recent years, with studying the middle class. Historians have progressed from a concern with the ‘success’ or ‘rise’ of the middle classes, to a study themper seboth in quantitative and qualitative terms: questions concerning their wealth, consumption patterns, residential preferences, representation within the political leadership as well as their beliefs, values and role in attention. Urban historians have a particular interest in the study of the local middle class, in a way that takes into account the finer detail of different kinds of urban environment and the complexities of the urban experience. Since much of urban history has been at pains to discover the variety of patterns in urban development and urban society, it is not surprising that recent specialized studies of individual towns and cities have revealed a great variety in the bases of class relations. Indeed, the traditional Marxist notion of a single national class interest is now open to qualification. The disparity between London and the provinces in respect of class interests has long been recognized. An extension of the proposition inherent in that disparity will contend here that there were different types of middle class located in different types of urban environment. Such a proposition is not in itself pathfinding or particularly new. There are problems, however, in deciding in what ways such a differentiated pattern can be drawn out, examined and presented in coherent form.