Quote:
american exports of food too often undercut the ability of poorer countries to develop anything like a self-sustaining agricultural infrastructure.
the main reason for this is that american agricultural subsidies amount to dumping.
when you combine this with neoliberal "free trade" ideology enforced by the imf as conditions for loans prevents these countries from using tarrifs as ways to protect local agriculture from their markets being flooded with cheaper, often much less beneficial, american products.
and much of what the americans export is shitty quality. in the example of jamaica, american powdered milk imports have nearly crushed the jamaican dairy industry. and it is not at all obvious that powdered milk offers any nutritional advantage, is it?
the policy of exporting food, then IS NOT simply a nice act by nice people.
you cannot view food exports in isolation.
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God forbid the US does anything out of the goodness of its own heart. If we donate food we're destroying lives and are horrid people. If we throw that food away we're destroying lives and are horrid people.
Give me a fucking break. When the US donates food to countries it's because their government has asked for food aid. Would you rather have a farmer have to change trades or a homeless man watch his wife and kids die the horrible slow death of starvation?