Economic analysis of agricultural marketing of the agricultural surplus and its effects on poverty in arid zone rural areas of South India - studies social classes and the agrarian structure; examines food consumption of low income households, food production and market access, production relations, etc.; discusses social discrimination through commodity markets and financial markets as well as seasonality of exchange and poverty. Bibliography, graphs, illustrations, references and statistical tables.

A joint FAO and World Bank study which shows how the farming systems approach can be used to identify priorities for the reduction of hunger and poverty in the main farming systems of the six major developing regions of the world.