Overview

The fifth and last volume in the 'Distortions to Agricultural Incentives' series focus on distortions to agricultural incentives from a global perspective. During the 1960s and 1970s most developing countries imposed anti-agricultural policies, while many high-income countries restricted agricultural imports and subsidized their farmers. Both sets of policies inhibited economic growth and poverty alleviation in developing countries. Since the 1980s, however, many developing countries began to reverse that policy trend. This book brings together the first-ever comprehensive and consistent set of estimates of the changing extent of those distortions over the past half-century. Those estimates show when each country's reforms began, how rapidly and completely they have progressed, how much of the improved incentives for farmers is due to reform of agricultural as compared with non-agricultural policies, which have 'overshot' to become agricultural protectionists like many high-income countries, and to what extent an anti-trade bias remains. Also provided are analytical narratives of the evolution of farm versus non-farm policies in each of dozens of countries, covering in aggregate around 90 percent of agricultural output and 95 percent of the world economy. Such a comprehensive coverage exposes also the different degrees to which the key agricultural product markets have been and still are distorted. The book concludes with new estimates of the effects of reforms since the early 1980s and of current policies - agricultural vs industrial - on such things as global goods markets, national economic welfare, and net farm incomes in all the major developing and high-income countries.

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9780821379738

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The international agricultural economy is bewilderingly complex, and an up-to-date study of economic policies and their effects has been sorely needed. Kym Anderson has done a remarkable job of leading such a huge ambitious study. This volume provides the synthesis and will serve as the standard reference for years to come, documenting the impacts of current policies toward agriculture and analyzing changes over the past several decades. With increasing concerns about global food supplies, it should be required reading for academics and policy makers seeking to understand the current structure of the international food economy and considering policy alternatives. - Anne O. Krueger, Professor, Johns Hopkins University and former First Deputy Managing Director, International Monetary Fund Food and agriculture are key contributors to global welfare, and no sector is more prone to government intervention. Kym Anderson and his collaborators have measured that intervention over half a century and shown that it is still alive and kicking. Data and quantification are the necessary precursors to effective research and to policy reform, so this excellent book provides a major impetus to rationalising international trade policy in agriculture. It is a must-read for all policy makers and students who care about feeding the world. - L. Alan Winters, Professor, University of Sussex and Chief Economist, UK Department for International Development On the basis of a very large body of new empirical evidence from case studies covering 75 countries, Kym Anderson provides the most comprehensive analytical assessment ever done of the world's agricultural trade policies and the changes during the last 50 years. As the Doha negotiations are on the verge of collapsing and associated benefits foregone, this book presents very strong and timely arguments for re-vitalizing the trade negotiations to promote global economic growth and poverty alleviation and to help achieving the Millennium Development Goals. This book is a must read for scholars and students of agricultural development and international trade and others who wish to better understand the costs of the current anti-trade bias existing in both developing and developed countries and what to do about it. - Per Pinstrup-Andersen, Professor, Cornell University and Copenhagen University, former Director-General of the International Food Policy Research Institute, and World Food Prize Laureate This book provides absolutely unique information on agricultural policies around the world, in an internationally comparable manner. It will serve a whole generation of analysts and policy makers with a benchmark against which to assess the pursuit of future policies in world agriculture. - Stefan Tangermann, Emeritus Professor, University of Gottingen and former OECD Director for Trade and Agriculture

Author Information

KYM ANDERSON is a Research Fellow at Europe's London-based Centre for Economic Policy Research, a Fellow of the American Agricultural Economic Association (AAEA), a Distinguished Fellow (and a past President) of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society (AARES), and a Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA). His research interests and publications are in the areas of international trade and development, agricultural economics, and environmental and resource economics. He has published more than 20 books and 200 journal articles and chapters in other books.

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