Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Ending agricultural subsidies

lurkette · 11-22-2005, 05:06 AM

I was listening to a story on NPR the other day about a new book (I think it's by the Skeptical Environmentalist author, Bjorn Lomborg, but I couldn't scare up the story in the NPR archives) that looks at which "global crises" have the biggest impact AND are the most tractable - the ones about which we could do something relatively quickly and easily. AIDS in Africa was one, so was treating malaria; the other one that was mentioned was ending agricultural subsidies in industrialized countries to give developing countries a fair chance to compete on the global market.

The way I understand the situation, governments like the U.S., France, Britain, etc., subsidize certain crops like corn, cotton, rice, soy beans etc., to keep the prices artificially low. This has the effect of lowering the global market price for those commodities so that growers in developing countries that could otherwise compete in the market are reduced to selling at subsistence levels, or forgoing production at all and becoming importers because it's just cheaper to buy the subsidized crops. Essentially, it turns countries that could become competitive exporters and could use agriculture as a springboard into the global economy into dependent consumers.

I know at least in the midwest of the U.S., where I grew up, agriculture is a sacred cow (no pun intended) and our government representatives will bend over backwards to protect the interests of farmers, especially now that corporate farming is the norm and they have the means to buy and sell political influence. So what will it take to get western countries to do the right thing and make their farmers compete in a truly free and fair global market?

P.S. The way I understand it, the end result for consumers won't be much different - food prices would probably not go up much, just the location of the supplier would change.

Which brings up another thorny issue for me - why does it make sense to buy, hypothetically, apples from Chile when there are plenty of American apples being exported to, say, Japan? Wouldn't it be just a lot more efficient to skip the global trade for commodities that can be obtained locally? I understand shipping stuff that can't be grown in your climate, but it seems like we import stuff from one country just to export ours to some other country. Why not just keep our own apples and let Japan (who has no apples) buy from Chile? Otherwise it seems like we're just trading apples for apples at great cost of energy and manpower. Makes no sense to me.

11-22-2005, 05:06 AM	#1 (permalink)
lurkette My future is coming on Moderator Emeritus Location: east of the sun and west of the moon	Ending agricultural subsidies - what will it take? I was listening to a story on NPR the other day about a new book (I think it's by the Skeptical Environmentalist author, Bjorn Lomborg, but I couldn't scare up the story in the NPR archives) that looks at which "global crises" have the biggest impact AND are the most tractable - the ones about which we could do something relatively quickly and easily. AIDS in Africa was one, so was treating malaria; the other one that was mentioned was ending agricultural subsidies in industrialized countries to give developing countries a fair chance to compete on the global market. The way I understand the situation, governments like the U.S., France, Britain, etc., subsidize certain crops like corn, cotton, rice, soy beans etc., to keep the prices artificially low. This has the effect of lowering the global market price for those commodities so that growers in developing countries that could otherwise compete in the market are reduced to selling at subsistence levels, or forgoing production at all and becoming importers because it's just cheaper to buy the subsidized crops. Essentially, it turns countries that could become competitive exporters and could use agriculture as a springboard into the global economy into dependent consumers. I know at least in the midwest of the U.S., where I grew up, agriculture is a sacred cow (no pun intended) and our government representatives will bend over backwards to protect the interests of farmers, especially now that corporate farming is the norm and they have the means to buy and sell political influence. So what will it take to get western countries to do the right thing and make their farmers compete in a truly free and fair global market? P.S. The way I understand it, the end result for consumers won't be much different - food prices would probably not go up much, just the location of the supplier would change. Which brings up another thorny issue for me - why does it make sense to buy, hypothetically, apples from Chile when there are plenty of American apples being exported to, say, Japan? Wouldn't it be just a lot more efficient to skip the global trade for commodities that can be obtained locally? I understand shipping stuff that can't be grown in your climate, but it seems like we import stuff from one country just to export ours to some other country. Why not just keep our own apples and let Japan (who has no apples) buy from Chile? Otherwise it seems like we're just trading apples for apples at great cost of energy and manpower. Makes no sense to me. __________________ "If ten million people believe a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing." - Anatole France Last edited by lurkette; 11-22-2005 at 05:10 AM..