The impact of depression and deglobalization on agricultural outcomes: Insights from interwar Ireland

In this study, agricultural census data from the 1920s and 1930s are digitized for the first time and used to investigate the impact on Irish agriculture of the Great Depression and the outbreak of the Anglo-Irish Trade War in... [ view full abstract ]

In this study, agricultural census data from the 1920s and 1930s are digitized for the first time and used to investigate the impact on Irish agriculture of the Great Depression and the outbreak of the Anglo-Irish Trade War in late 1932. In particular, we explore the impact of the Great Depression on prices for agricultural products, yields, area devoted to particular crops and land value. This is done by exploiting variation in the types of products most exposed to global trade and the proportion of land devoted to those products.