FOREWORD









The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
is required by its charter to use the three official languages


English, French and Spanish for publication of its documents
and, at world conferences, to provide simultaneous interpretation
from any one of the three languages into the other two. It is
therefore mandatory that equivalents exist for the myriad of terms
and concepts used in all of the agricultural sciences. These
exist for most of the physical sciences; social sciences have
also developed equivalents, but there is still a relatively large
number of terms in the science of Farm Management Economics for
which there are no universally agreed definitions.

In addition, some basic concepts and terms have different meanings
or interpretations between agricultural economists themselves.
This fact makes it difficult to communicate accurately with the
multitude of institutions around the world.

These considerations prompted FAO to compare the terminology
employed in English, French and Spanish and to establish
equivalences between terms. A preliminary version of the glossary
was printed and circulated in 1982 in universities and
international institutions, with a request for comments and
suggestions. Many specialists responded to this demand and their
comments have been incorporated to this version. However, this is
still considered a draft glossary and the final version is
scheduled for 1984/85. Hence comments and suggestions will be
appreciated. They should be forwarded to

 Dr. N.R. Carpenter
 Chief, Farm Management and Production Economics Service
 Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N.
 Via delle Terme di Caracalla
 00100 Rome, Italy