Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Canada, France and Australia can rely. But what about the farmers producing cas-
sava in Peru, or sorghum in Uganda or export rice in Indonesia? And what about the
large percentage of the world unable to grow, or unconcerned with growing, their
own food? Consumers are just as victimized by uneven trading practices in global
food. This contradiction between free market ideology and protectionist reality in-
hibits business-as-usual from delivering for everyone in the global food system.
he current global food system (including suh aspects as food aid, famine relief,
nutrition policy, etc.) generates uneven outcomes, manifest in vast wealth accumu-
lation by corporate interests and massive hunger for over a sixth of the globe. Does
suh unevenness demonstrate market success? Or, pertinent to our purposes here, is
muh of that aid and the imperative to feed the world simply an 'externality cost' of
deregulation - in essence, the pursuit of increasingly open markets and free trade is
completely contrary to a world in whih food security, not to mention food sover-
eignty, can be ahieved.
Straightforward political-economic theories tend to underestimate the ability of
firms and their relationships with governance structures to adapt. Enter regulation
theory (originating in France) - or, as Bob Jessop argues, regularization theory. Regu-
lation theory posits that capitalistic systems - firms, advocacy groups and their in-
tersections with governments - manipulate legal systems and markets to balance the
tension between insulating business and allowing for growth. The objective is to sta-
bilize international markets to allow for accumulation, while also providing space
for enough volatility to promote a competitive atmosphere for business. This is the
ultimate tension between open markets and ensuring the common welfare.
Following the insights of regulation theory, it is apparent that any assumption
of stability in the global food system is naive. The state of that system is subject to
its position within the broader global economy. As the recent banking crisis reveals,
profit seekers - mainly in the form of corporations, but represented by individuals
- will push the limits of acceptable rent-seeking through financialization until told
otherwise. In other words, the ability to make money depends on continually hav-
ing new places to generate wealth - suh as the creation of debt derivatives, whih
facilitate the frequent re-selling of the same debt so that everybody along the hain
can accumulate capital, while the debt becomes worthless. Feeding the world with
food commodities depends on people paying above cost for the products to ensure
a profitable exercise. At the same time, when you push yourself over the precipice
there's nowhere to go but down.
