The Importance of Being First: Preemption by Early Adopters of Farming Innovations in Kenya

Abstract

Current spatial diffusion theory largely overlooks the frequent cases of preemption of valuable innovations by early adopters. Instead, diffusion is generally assumed to be constrained mainly by non-receptive attitudes among potential adopters and by infrastructural factors, especially diffusion-enabling institutions. In Third World countries, entrenched elites are thought to arise when, as early adopters, certain individuals gain large but temporary windfall profits or adoption rents from consecutive innovations to which they have ready access. This paper illustrates how early adopters with oligopoly powers are able to transform temporary adoption rents into permanent excess incomes—preemption rents—through political actions, such as lobbying for legislation to prevent the further spread of new crops or to limit access to processing facilities. The paper introduces the concept of preemption rent and examines its geographical consequences in the diffusion of coffee, pyrethrum, and processed dairy products in Kenya. These cases indicate that oligopolistic controls to prevent diffusion still operate in Kenya even though the original white settler oligopoly has long since been replaced by an African one. The study suggests that diffusion theory should be modified to recognize retention barriers set up by early adopters and to weigh the geographical effects of preemption rents.

Key Words:

• innovation diffusion
• preemption rents
• early adopters
• oligopoly
• legislated quotas
• coffee
• pyrethrum
• milk
• Kenya
• underdevelopment