Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
whih emerged as the most dynamic export crop in the 1990s, is produced mainly
by large farms. Greater export opportunities may also lead to the reallocation of
land and other resources away from domestic food production, with possible ad-
verse consequences for household food security.
FAO (2003)
here is minimal 'negotiating space' within current WTO agendas for suh con-
siderations to be included within the emergent scope of international trade rules. As
noted above, the ideology behind WTO-led liberalization would see suh issues as
indirect distributional consequences of trade, whih it is the responsibility of nation-
al governments to address. Employing a Ricardian comparative advantage perspect-
ive, a liberalizer would argue (using the above-cited case of Peru) that the export
of fresh asparagus provides an addition to Peru's national income, whih could be
taxed, and the revenues from this could be used to help fund a larger food safety net,
thus producing a win-win outcome for both the national economy and food-insec-
ure households. Suh a model is not to be dismissed out of hand - international stat-
istics demonstrate overarhing correlations at the national scale between economic
growth and net reductions in undernourishment - but detailed studies of the nexus
between export agriculture and poverty/food insecurity alleviation frequently belie
the simplifications inherent in the proponents of liberalization (see Berry (2001) for
a good outline of these arguments).
In summary, the ideological privileging within the WTO for resolving food se-
curity via the invisible hand of the market has the effect of generating policy my-
opia with regards to deeper and more nuanced understandings of the grounded rela-
tionships between trade policy and food security. This does not deny the undoubted
propensity for liberal markets to advance resource efficiency; as Watkins (2008, p155)
attests, 'Under the right conditions, agricultural trade could act as a powerful force
for poverty reduction'. However, the pursuit of these policies in contexts where key
agreements are not framed around sophisticated understandings of the connections
between trade and food security could exacerbate, rather than resolve, current prob-
lems. Member states at the WTO carry with them these understandings, whih foster
reluctance to endorse the liberalization project for agriculture. To a considerable ex-
tent, the collapse of Doha Round negotiations in 2008 (and their failure to be restar-
ted in the period since) can be atributed to these factors.
