provide the cash required for participation in the market economy. The limited development of the non-agricultural sector of the rural econ omy also restricts local employment opportun. ities. In such circumstances, labour migration provides an invaluable source of cash income for poor rural households struggling to satisfy even their basic subsistence needs from the land.
5. Agricultural intensification. The intensification of agriculture and the introduction of modern farmi g practices have helped to absorb rural population growth (e.g. in Java and the Indian Punjab) but have also often had the opposite effect by replacing agricultural labourers with mechanical and technologically intensive farm- ing systems. In Malaysia thousands of paddy farmers have been displaced as the government sought to improve productivity in the rice- growing sector by investing in major irrigation schemes and consolidating fragmented paddy farms. In the absence of alternative rural employment, landless iabourers have moved to the cities in search of work. In Latin America programmes of agrarian reform released have peasant farmers from feudal systems of tied Aabour that had hitherto restricted migration.
URBAN RULL FACTORS
1. Wage and em fferentials. The princi- pa cause of rural-urban migration is the higher wages and more varied employment opportunities available in the city There is ample evidence that patterns of migration switch in response to changes income dif- in ferentials between destinations. 10 Comparison of urban and rural standards of living is complicated by: