On Cato's Agricultural Thinking

Agriculture in the lives of the Romans to occupy a very important position, to ancient Rome, the rapid development of political economy has played an extremely important role in promoting.Cato is the first Roman agronomist, who according to their own personal practice,wrote"De Agricultura", already has a fairly clear at that time even the most advanced agricultural thought,he is the originator of Roman agriculture.Cato's agricultural thought far-reaching impact on future generations, some of its advanced agricultural business management concept is still worthy of our study and use for reference.The text discusses the Cato's agricultural thought specifically from the following four sections:Part one presents that the background of Cato's agricultural thought.The 3rd century B.C. middle period to the 2nd century middle period, Rome has obtained the big piece land, the thousands slave as well as the large amount wealth through a series of foreign wars, urges Rome social economy to have the tremendous change, the small-scale landownership trend perishes gradually, slavery large-scale landownership obtains the big development, the agriculture realizes the commodity economization gradually. Cato is born in the common people family which is farmers for many generations, is not only an outstanding military officer, the statesman, the orator, is also the writer and the historian,who is wealthy in knowledge, is the agronomist who pays great attention to practice, not to defend the outmoded rules and regulations.Part two expounds the Cato's agricultural thought.It mainly divides into three parts:first,the thought about value agriculture while contempt trade and both equally;second, the thought about who fulfill their duties, to make the best use of,it includes clearly the responsibility of managers,maximize the effectiveness of personnel and equipment,carries on the management using the contract;third,adjust measures to local conditions and intensive management thoughts,it is mainly manifested in a reasonable choice of crops, according to local conditions, a variety of management, and precision farming, intensive business.Part three comprehensive analyzes the practices of Cato's agricultural thought-cato style manor. Cato style manor belongs to the moderate scale commercial real estate, its exterior characteristic is showed mainly through the distributed condition, the composition, the organizational structure characteristic of the manor. Its internal economy characteristic mainly manifests in that the natural economy occupies the important position and the manor uses the specialized production and the labor organization. Cato-style estate is the basis of self-sufficiency, but also a commodity with economic factors.Part four Outlines for the overall appraisal of Cato's agricultural thought.Cato's agricultural thought belongs to the domain of the agricultural commodity economy.But he lived in the low level of productivity, science and technology developed slave society, which determines his agricultural ideas with a certain geographical and historical limitations.