Ignoring the Neoliberals and Agricultural Transformation - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

roachboy · 12-01-2007, 11:20 AM

this article appeared today in the new york times:

Quote:

December 2, 2007
Ending Famine, Simply by Ignoring the Experts
By CELIA W. DUGGER

LILONGWE, Malawi — Malawi hovered for years at the brink of famine. After a disastrous corn harvest in 2005, almost five million of its 13 million people needed emergency food aid.

But this year, a nation that has perennially extended a begging bowl to the world is instead feeding its hungry neighbors. It is selling more corn to the United Nation’s World Food Program than any other country in southern Africa and is exporting hundreds of thousands of tons of corn to Zimbabwe.

In Malawi itself, the prevalence of acute child hunger has fallen sharply. In October, the United Nations Children’s Fund sent three tons of powdered milk, stockpiled here to treat severely malnourished children, to Uganda instead. “We will not be able to use it!” Juan Ortiz-Iruri, Unicef’s deputy representative in Malawi, said jubilantly.

Farmers explain Malawi’s extraordinary turnaround — one with broad implications for hunger-fighting methods across Africa — with one word: fertilizer.

Over the past 20 years, the World Bank and some rich nations Malawi depends on for aid have periodically pressed this small, landlocked country to adhere to free market policies and cut back or eliminate fertilizer subsidies, even as the United States and Europe extensively subsidized their own farmers. But after the 2005 harvest, the worst in a decade, Bingu wa Mutharika, Malawi’s newly elected president, decided to follow what the West practiced, not what it preached.

Stung by the humiliation of pleading for charity, he led the way to reinstating and deepening fertilizer subsidies despite a skeptical reception from the United States and Britain. Malawi’s soil, like that across sub-Saharan Africa, is gravely depleted, and many, if not most, of its farmers are too poor to afford fertilizer at market prices.

“As long as I’m president, I don’t want to be going to other capitals begging for food,” Mr. Mutharika declared. Patrick Kabambe, the senior civil servant in the Agriculture Ministry, said the president told his advisers, “Our people are poor because they lack the resources to use the soil and the water we have.”

The country’s successful use of subsidies is contributing to a broader reappraisal of the crucial role of agriculture in alleviating poverty in Africa and the pivotal importance of public investments in the basics of a farm economy: fertilizer, improved seed, farmer education, credit and agricultural research.

Malawi, an overwhelmingly rural nation about the size of Pennsylvania, is an extreme example of what happens when those things are missing. As its population has grown and inherited landholdings have shrunk, impoverished farmers have planted every inch of ground. Desperate to feed their families, they could not afford to let their land lie fallow or to fertilizer it. Over time, their depleted plots yielded less food and the farmers fell deeper into poverty.

Malawi’s leaders have long favored fertilizer subsidies, but they reluctantly acceded to donor prescriptions, often shaped by foreign-aid fashions in Washington, that featured a faith in private markets and an antipathy to government intervention.

In the 1980s and again in the 1990s, the World Bank pushed Malawi to eliminate fertilizer subsidies entirely. Its theory both times was that Malawi’s farmers should shift to growing cash crops for export and use the foreign exchange earnings to import food, according to Jane Harrigan, an economist at the University of London.

In a withering evaluation of the World Bank’s record on African agriculture, the bank’s own internal watchdog concluded in October not only that the removal of subsidies had led to exorbitant fertilizer prices in African countries, but that the bank itself had often failed to recognize that improving Africa’s declining soil quality was essential to lifting food production.

“The donors took away the role of the government and the disasters mounted,” said Jeffrey Sachs, a Columbia University economist who lobbied Britain and the World Bank on behalf of Malawi’s fertilizer program and who has championed the idea that wealthy countries should invest in fertilizer and seed for Africa’s farmers.

Here in Malawi, deep fertilizer subsidies and lesser ones for seed, abetted by good rains, helped farmers produce record-breaking corn harvests in 2006 and 2007, according to government crop estimates. Corn production leapt from 1.2 billion metric tons in 2005, to 2.7 billion in 2006 and 3.4 billion in 2007, the government reported.

“The rest of the world is fed because of the use of good seed and inorganic fertilizer, full stop,” said Stephen Carr, who has lived in Malawi since 1989, when he retired as the World Bank’s principal agriculturalist in sub-Saharan Africa. “This technology has not been used in most of Africa. The only way you can help farmers gain access to it is to give it away free or subsidize it heavily.”

“The government has taken the bull by the horns and done what farmers wanted,” he said. Some economists have questioned whether Malawi’s 2007 bumper harvest should be credited to good rains or subsidies, but an independent evaluation, financed by the United States and Britain, found that the subsidy program accounted for a large share of this year’s increase in corn production.

The harvest also helped the poor by lowering food prices and increasing wages for farm workers. Researchers at Imperial College London and Michigan State University concluded in their preliminary report that a well-run subsidy program in a sensibly managed economy “has the potential to drive growth forward out of the poverty trap in which many Malawians and the Malawian economy are currently caught.”

Farmers interviewed recently in Malawi’s southern and central regions said fertilizer had greatly improved their ability to fill their bellies with nsima, the thick, cornmeal porridge that is Malawi’s staff of life.

In the hamlet of Mthungu, Enelesi Chakhaza, an elderly widow whose husband died of hunger five years ago, boasted that she got two ox-cart-loads of corn this year from her small plot instead of half a cart.

Last year, roughly half the country’s farming families received coupons that entitled them to buy two 110-pound bags of fertilizer, enough to nourish an acre of land, for around $15 — about a third the market price. The government also gave them coupons for enough seed to plant less than half an acre.

Malawians are still haunted by the hungry season of 2001-02. That season, an already shrunken program to give poor farmers enough fertilizer and seed to plant a meager quarter acre of land had been reduced again. Regional flooding further lowered the harvest. Corn prices surged. And under the government then in power, the country’s entire grain reserve was sold as a result of mismanagement and corruption.

Mrs. Chakhaza watched her husband starve to death that season. His strength ebbed away as they tried to subsist on pumpkin leaves. He was one of many who succumbed that year, said K. B. Kakunga, the local Agriculture Ministry official. He recalled mothers and children begging for food at his door.

“I had a little something, but I could not afford to help each and every one,” he said. “It was very pathetic, very pathetic indeed.”

But Mr. Kakunga brightened as he talked about the impact of the subsidies, which he said had more than doubled corn production in his jurisdiction since 2005.

“It’s quite marvelous!” he exclaimed.

Malawi’s determination to heavily subsidize fertilizer and the payoff in increased production are beginning to change the attitudes of donors, say economists who have studied Malawi’s experience.

Britain’s Department for International Development contributed $8 million to the subsidy program last year. Bernabé Sánchez, an economist with the agency in Malawi, estimated the extra corn produced because of the $74 million subsidy was worth $120 million to $140 million.

“It was really a good economic investment,” he said.

The United States, which has shipped $147 million worth of American food to Malawi as emergency relief since 2002, but only $53 million to help Malawi grow its own food, has not provided any financial support for the subsidy program, except for helping pay for the evaluation of it. Over the years, the United States Agency for International Development has focused on promoting the role of the private sector in delivering fertilizer and seed, and saw subsidies as undermining that effort.

But Alan Eastham, the American ambassador to Malawi, said in a recent interview that the subsidy program had worked “pretty well,” though it displaced some commercial fertilizer sales.

“The plain fact is that Malawi got lucky last year,” he said. “They got fertilizer out while it was needed. The lucky part was that they got the rains.”

And the World Bank now sometimes supports the temporary use of subsidies aimed at the poor and carried out in a way that fosters private markets.

Here in Malawi, bank officials say they generally support Malawi’s policy, though they criticize the government for not having a strategy to eventually end the subsidies, question whether its 2007 corn production estimates are inflated and say there is still a lot of room for improvement in how the subsidy is carried out.

“The issue is, let’s do a better job of it,” said David Rohrbach, a senior agricultural economist at the bank.

Though the donors are sometimes ambivalent, Malawi’s farmers have embraced the subsidies. And the government moved this year to give its people a more direct hand in their distribution.

The village of Chembe gathered one recent morning under the spreading arms of a kachere tree to decide who most needed fertilizer coupons as the planting season loomed. They only had enough for 19 of the village’s 53 families.

“Ladies and gentlemen, should we start with the elderly or the orphans?” Samuel Dama, a representative of the Chembe clan, asked.

Men led the assembly, but women sitting on the ground at their feet called out almost all the names of the neediest, gesturing to families rearing children orphaned by AIDS or caring for toothless elders.

There were more poor families than there were coupons, so grumbling began among those who knew they would have to watch over the coming year as their neighbors’ fertilized corn fields turned deep green.

Sensing the rising resentment, the village chief, Zaudeni Mapila, rose. Barefoot and dressed in dusty jeans and a royal blue jacket, he acted out a silly pantomime of husbands stuffing their pants with corn to sell on the sly for money to get drunk at the beer hall. The women howled with laughter. The tension fled.

He closed with a reminder he hoped would dampen any jealousy.

“I don’t want anyone to complain,” he said. “It’s not me who chose. It’s you.”

The women sang back to him in a chorus of acknowledgment, then dispersed to their homes and fields.

in host's thread on the functions of the redistribution of wealth, i posted something on how i understood neoliberalism to operate....in the back of my mind, i was thinking of the enormous amount of data that i have seen/accumulated on the debacle that neoliberal economic prescriptions have been in the southern hemisphere, on the curious lack of information about these failures in the context of the american ideological bubble that we refer to as "the press"....so here is an example.

world bank/imf prescriptions have made disastrous situations in the southern hemisphere worse.
using debt to leverage roll-backs in state actions to stabilize economies in general, and fundamental sectors like agriculture in particular, have functioned to make many countries de facto dumping grounds for american mono-crop based agricultural overproduction. this over-production is made possible by a vast array of state subsidies to particular types of agricultural production in the states, which priveleges certain types of crops (particularly corn, often gm corn) and particular corporate interests (can you can monsanto?) over all else. the results in the states have been catastrophic if you look at them--catastrophic in certain ways that i could go into, but wont for the moment.
this subsidiy system is defended with great ardor by the conservative set that is actually in power--but the ideology espoused by these same folk is staight neo-liberalism. so the dumping of over-production of agricultural commodities produced in the states based on subsidy rates that are often over 100% of the cost of production lay behind the empty rhetoric of markets, their rationality, the irrationalities of the state--all of which inform neoliberal policies, enforced via structural adjustment programs.

sooner or later, neoliberalism has to be seenas the joke it is.
this is a good starting point.
what do you think?

ottopilot · 12-01-2007, 12:09 PM

host · 12-01-2007, 12:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

this article appeared today in the new york times:

in host's thread on the functions of the redistribution of wealth, i posted something on how i understood neoliberalism to operate....in the back of my mind, i was thinking of the enormous amount of data that i have seen/accumulated on the debacle that neoliberal economic prescriptions have been in the southern hemisphere, on the curious lack of information about these failures in the context of the american ideological bubble that we refer to as "the press"....so here is an example.

world bank/imf prescriptions have made disastrous situations in the southern hemisphere worse.
using debt to leverage roll-backs in state actions to stabilize economies in general, and fundamental sectors like agriculture in particular, have functioned to make many countries de facto dumping grounds for american mono-crop based agricultural overproduction. this over-production is made possible by a vast array of state subsidies to particular types of agricultural production in the states, which priveleges certain types of crops (particularly corn, often gm corn) and particular corporate interests (can you can monsanto?) over all else. the results in the states have been catastrophic if you look at them--catastrophic in certain ways that i could go into, but wont for the moment.
this subsidiy system is defended with great ardor by the conservative set that is actually in power--but the ideology espoused by these same folk is staight neo-liberalism. so the dumping of over-production of agricultural commodities produced in the states based on subsidy rates that are often over 100% of the cost of production lay behind the empty rhetoric of markets, their rationality, the irrationalities of the state--all of which inform neoliberal policies, enforced via structural adjustment programs.

sooner or later, neoliberalism has to be seenas the joke it is.
this is a good starting point.
what do you think?

I don't like inorganic fertilizer:

Quote:

http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache...lnk&cd=4&gl=us
An Agricultural Solution
To the
Imported Petroleum and Pollution Crises
March 31, 2004

.... It takes 40 pounds of nitrogen fertilizer to grow an acre of legumes such as soybeans
versus more than 200 pounds for corn because like most legumes, soybeans can fix
nitrogen from the air and corn cannot. Therefore, oil-producing soybeans and the Pongam
Bush (
Pongamia Pinnata)
are the preferred crop to use the nitrogen content of
wastewater. However, the greatest oil production per acre is from the Oil Palm Tree
which would thrive in the southwestern deserts with adequate water and nutrients.
• One of the obstacles to growing petroleum alternatives is the cost of fertilizer, which
requires a natural gas and petroleum to produce. .....

I don't know that it is a sustainable solution, especially if the result is to increase Malawi's population. Are the farmers competent to use the fertilizer so as not to damage the soil from overuse, and from trace elements in the soil not getting replaced because of poor soil testing resources and because the trace elements are not ingredients in the inorganic fertilizer. This tyoe of fertilizer does not fix well to the soil of to plant roots, causing runoff and unwanted nitrogren pollution to streams/rivers/lakes and ground water.

I suspect that this was a project to market American corp.s' fertilizer, but it seems to have impacted some locals, too:

Quote:

http://www.usaid.gov/stories/malawi/...ertilizer.html

For Malawian farmers, fertilizer can make the difference between a hungry year and a healthy one. Malawi has one of the highest population densities in Africa, with 85% of the population farming on small plots. Soil degradation is widespread, and homegrown manure from livestock or composting isn’t commonly practiced. Most farmers rely on chemical fertilizer for a good harvest. Until the mid-1990’s, fertilizer sales -- mostly imported -- were controlled and subsidized by the government. When the system was privatized, a few central companies took over. But poor distribution and high prices meant that fertilizer was inaccessible for many smallholder farmers.

Beginning in 2002, USAID began to revitalize fertilizer distribution in Malawi with support to the International Center for Fertility and Agricultural Development. USAID began by developing a network of middle- and small- sized business dealers in fertilizer. The middle-level dealers purchase fertilizer from the supplier, then distribute it to local dealers. This creates a system of credit for the local dealers, who are usually village shop owners with little cash and no access to credit.

In less than two years, there are over 1,000 new fertilizer dealers with 30% of them women. At village shops, local dealers receive training in business skills, which is essential since the adult literacy rate in Malawi is 60%. The dealers are organized into district associations, now in twenty-seven of Malawi’s twenty-nine districts. These associations provide accountability and the leverage to buy fertilizer in bulk. As the associations grow in number and gain experience, USAID expects fertilizer to be cheaper and more accessible to millions of Malawians in the next few years.

I think that this "bailout" is a better example, rb.... On the surface, it is confined to "aiding homeowners" (bagholders) who cannot afford higher monthly payments caused by adjustable interest rate "reset" provisions.

The consequence of being "saved" by this program is win win for lenders and those with equity who are trying to sell. The "saved" already are in negative equity circimstances. They owe more than the value of the property. That won't change because prices will continue to decline, only slightly slower because of this lender bailout.

This turns mortgagees, their credit already poorly rated, into debt slaves, Their "deals" were only feasible, in the first place, IF the housing ponzi scheme could push continued increasingly higher prices, pushing these high risk "last in" buyers, into positive equity that would allow for refi's at more favorable terms, or they could sell at a profit and "trade up".

Now they'll pay to stay longer in homes that are going to lose value for an undetermined number of future years. It is in their interests to walk away...default....and leave the losses for the lenders to suffer.

They will walk as prices go down further, after wasting huge, avoidable sums on additional mortgage payments for the privilege of paying muliples of what monthly rent would be if they had walked sooner. They are being robbed of the opportunity to default, pay much lower rent....they won't gain any equity by paying more mortgage payments on these properties. They could be saving the difference between the much lower rent cost and the present mortgage payment amount, for a downpayment, after their credit ratings improve, on a comparable or better property five years from now, and borrow less at that future time....due to having accumulated a downpayment, and lower housing prices, than the terms and property they are trapped in now.

Note the plummeting asking prices in an area still enjoying employment growth and high wages:
http://www.southsanjose.com/realtren...ef=patrick.net

This "save" puts all the risk on the mortgagees and is only a subsidy for reckless or even fraudulant lenders, but they put lipstick on it and sell it as in your OP example, rb !

Quote:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/busine...,3775994.story
U.S., banks craft foreclosure rescue plan
But exactly who gets the help is uncertain

By William Neikirk | Tribune senior correspondent
December 1, 2007

....The proposal, which could be announced as early as next week by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, is designed to help almost all groups involved in the surge of house buying in the last few years that resulted in many marginal borrowers taking out "subprime" adjustable-rate mortgages. These loans will reset at higher rates in great numbers over the next year.

In addition to borrowers, it would also salvage some of the now-questionable mortgage investments made by lenders, loan-service companies and bondholders. And it would give the Bush administration cover from the charge it is indifferent to those hurt by the housing price correction now in full force.

Analysts said the move could forestall a wave of foreclosures and evictions many fear would tip the economy into a recession in 2008. Also helping will be the prospect of more interest rate reductions by the Federal Reserve, which Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke hinted at in a speech Thursday......

roachboy · 12-01-2007, 01:35 PM

i take the point concerning inorganic fertilizers, host...i left it to the side of the discussion for the time being mostly because i wanted to focus attention on the effects of state action, in defiance of neoliberal conventional wisdom, in jumpstarting malawian agricultural production---and in particular i wanted to emphasize the tack adopted both in malawi and the nyt piece that what m is doing is what the americans DO not what they SAY.

it's hard to tell, based on the nyt piece (and the short bit that you posted as well) what type of production is being underwritten--whether it is monocropping, for example, or more locally oriented, diversified types of production, what mixture of the two, and how state funding is being directed exactly. the downside of the information above is the emphasis on corn alone, which makes me wonder if malawi is imitating exactly the american monocrop-dominant model and subsidy underpinnings. if that is the case, then it is not sustainable, really---but that said, it is still what i said it was vis-a-vis neoliberal ideology--a clear, obvious, straightforward rejection of a way of orienting policy that simply does not work outside the space of modelling exercises and cherry-picked economic data.

the us mortage bailout plan is interesting---and to the extent that it points to a parallel gap separating the rhetoric of free markets and the use of state subsidies to address the consequences of policy implemented based on the assumption that this rhetoric is more than just that--- but for purposes here. i would personally prefer to keep it to the side, or explore it in another thread (i know you've tried, sir...): i'd prefer it if the focus here was mostly on southern hemisphere countries, simply because they are the most direct victims of this religious faith in neoliberalism particular to the imf/worldbank nexus, and so are spaces where the failure of policies based on neoliberalism are most obvious (and devastating materially, at least so far)---and data about this is much less present within the media bubble than are problems around american consumer debt levels.

also, maintaining the separation of topics directs attention more easily to american agricultural subsidies as a self-evident example of another gap--the one that separates the rhetoric of "the level playing field" and the reality of dumping (with all the attending destruction of food self-sufficiency, which flies in the face of imf/world bank talk talk talk about their "concern for poverty and ending hunger")....it's hard to avoid the conclusion that this "level playing field" means nothing, that it is a thin veneer behind which american economic domination is justified...and that, knowing something of the realities behind these word word words, points to yet another curious gap, the one that separates the articles of faith particular to domestic populist conservatism in the states and the policies undertaken by the political class which claims to represent these articles of faith.

host · 12-01-2007, 02:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

.....also, maintaining the separation of topics directs attention more easily to american agricultural subsidies as a self-evident example of another gap--the one that separates the rhetoric of "the level playing field" and the reality of dumping (with all the attending destruction of food self-sufficiency, which flies in the face of imf/world bank talk talk talk about their "concern for poverty and ending hunger")....it's hard to avoid the conclusion that this "level playing field" means nothing, that it is a thin veneer behind which american economic domination is justified...and that, knowing something of the realities behind these word word words, points to yet another curious gap, the one that separates the articles of faith particular to domestic populist conservatism in the states and the policies undertaken by the political class which claims to represent these articles of faith.

I understand, rb, and I'll stay on topic here, except for urging you to read this:
www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/9/22/193331/112 because I think the rest of the world is beginning to "wise up". It is very well explained piece about what the US and allied Over developed countries have been up to, colonialism never really died:

rb, what kind of world would it be if ADM and Cargill never emerged?

Quote:

http://www.laborrights.org/projects/...aint_Jul05.pdf
I. NATURE OF THE ACTION
1. Plaintiffs John Doe I, John Doe II, and John Doe III (referred to herein as the
“Former Child Slave” Plaintiffs) <h3>are all former child slaves of Malian origin who were trafficked
and forced to work harvesting and/or cultivating cocoa beans on farms in Cote d’Ivoire, which
supply cocoa beans to the Defendant companies named herein.</h3> The Former Child Slave
Plaintiffs bring this action on behalf of themselves and all other similarly situated former child
slaves of Malian origin against Defendants: Nestlé, S.A., Nestlé, U.S.A., and Nestlé Cote
d’Ivoire, S.A. (together as “Nestlé”); Cargill, Incorporated (“Cargill, Inc.”), Cargill Cocoa, and
Cargill West Africa, S.A. (together as “Cargill”); and Archer Daniels Midland Company
(“ADM”) (referred to collectively as the “Chocolate Importers” or Defendants) for the forced
labor and torture they suffered as a result of the wrongful conduct either caused and/or aided and
abetted by these corporate entities. Specifically, the Former Child Slave Plaintiffs assert claims
under the Alien Tort Statute (“ATS”), 28 U.S.C. § 1350, and the Torture Victim Protection Act
(“TVPA”), 28 U.S.C. § 1350, note. The Former Child Slaves also bring claims for forced labor
and involuntary servitude under the U.S. Constitution, Amendment 13, 18 U.S.C. §§ 1589, 1590,
1595 and under California’s Constitution Article 1, Section 6, as well as for breach of contract,
negligence, unjust enrichment and unfair business practices under California’s Business &
Professions Code §§ 17200, et. seq.
2. The Former Child Slave Plaintiffs bring their ATS and TVPA actions in the
United States because such claims cannot be maintained in their home country of Mali as
currently there is no law in Mali whereby such Plaintiffs can seek civil damages for their injuries
against the major exporters of cocoa operating outside of Mali. Nor could claims be brought in
Cote d’Ivoire as the judicial system is notoriously corrupt and would likely be unresponsive to
the claims of foreign children against major cocoa corporations operating in and bringing
significant revenue to Cote d’Ivoire. It is also likely that both Plaintiffs and their attorneys would
be placed in danger following the civil unrest in Cote d’Ivoire and the general hostility by cocoa
producers in the region where Plaintiffs were forced to work. Further, the Former Child Slave
Plaintiffs bring their claims in the United States as the U.S. has provided a forum for such human...

It's "all Illinois"

Quote:

http://www.illinois.gov/PressRelease...1&SubjectID=54
"1999 Illinois-Cuba Humanitarian Mission"
Report
of
Governor George H. Ryan
State of Illinois
October 23-27, 1999

Executive Summary

Illinois Governor George H. Ryan led a 45 member state delegation on an intensive, five-day humanitarian mission to Cuba October 23rd through the 27th, 1999. The diverse group - which included the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives Michael Madigan (D-22), Illinois House Minority Leader Lee A. Daniels (R-46), Illinois Senate Minority Leader Emil Jones, Jr. (D-14), Illinois State Senator Todd Seiben (R-37), Illinois State Representative Edgar Lopez (D-4), Illinois State Representative Dan Rutherford (R-44), three members of the Governor's Cabinet, <h3>Allen Andreas, CEO of Archer Daniels Midland Corporation</h3>, Dan Martin, Director of E cosystems Conservation & Policy of the MacArthur Foundation, Anne Doris Davis, President of the Illinois Education Association, George Obernagle, President of the Illinois Corn Growers Association, Dr. David Chicoine, Dean of the College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at the University of Illinois, Dr. Carl Getto, Dean of the College of Medicine at Southern Illinois University, and Bishop Joseph Perry representing Francis Cardinal George and the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago - committed over $1 million worth of donated humanitarian assistance (food, medicine and school supplies) from the people of Illinois to the people of Cuba. All humanitarian aid not carried and distributed by the delegation during the mission was sent or is in the process of being sent through Catholic charities.

The Governor and his party visited schools, hospitals, farms, churches and a synagogue; met with eight leading Cuban dissidents; had frank discussions with top Cuban government officials; a seven hour dinner meeting with Fidel Castro; and met with Cuban student leaders who attended a major address the Governor delivered at the University of Havana.

Although humanitarian in purpose, the mission was politically significant to many observers, Governor Ryan became the first sitting US governor to visit the island in over 40 years. The US government's policy - in place and essentially unchanged since 1960 - has been to apply economic and political pressure through the US imposed embargo to try to force Fidel Castro from power.

US policy towards Cuba has survived eight separate American presidents - from both political parties. It is a policy that has been largely driven by political strength of the Cuban exile community in South Florida. It clearly harms the economic interests of the American farmers by using food as a political weapon. And , it diminishes the United States' moral authority by continuing an embargo that has been condemned by virtually every other government in the world.

During a breakfast meeting at the residence of the Principal Officer of the US Interests Section in Havana, the Governor discussed the embargo with six ambassadors invited by the US State Department: Germany, Canada, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Poland and the Vatican. All of them - without exception - agreed that the embargo is morally wrong, ineffective in its intended purpose, and should be lifted.

The Governor also met with eight leading Cuban dissidents invited by the US State Department to discuss human rights issues. Again, at the conclusion of the meeting, all eight participants - without exception - urged that the US Embargo be lifted....

Former gov. Ryan, prosecuted for corruption by Libby prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, began serving his sentence last month.

Cuba has "dodged a bullet" by being embargoed by the US for 47 years. The tentacles of US agri-business have been kept almost entirely out of that country.

Guess who is the largest <a href="http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/2007/snapshots/1270.html">auto insurer</a> in the US, is based in Illinois, is exempt from anti-trust regs with regard to "the business of insurance", is privately held, and has the largest reserve portfolio of any US insurer (more than $70 billion), and, as I know from looking at ADM as a possible stock trade in 1999 when ADM dropped to $8.00/share, the insurer owned the same percentage of ADM then, as it does now:
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/mh?s=adm nearly nine percent of all ADM shares.

Quote:

http://www.motherjones.com/news/spec...07/carney.html
Dwayne's World

News: Dwayne Andreas has made a fortune with the help of politicians from Hubert Humphrey to Bob Dole. But, he says, their talk of "free markets" is just wind.

By Dan Carney

July/August 1995 Issue

Just off Route 48 east of Decatur, Ill., the corn fields suddenly stop and the vast web of grain elevators, industrial stills, and office buildings that constitutes Archer Daniels Midland Co.'s headquarters begins. It is a colossal expanse of steel and concrete that alters both landscape and sky with its giant gray boxes spewing out clouds of steam.

This is the place where corn, wheat, and soybeans from the American breadbasket are brought to be manufactured into the "food products" that go into everything from Campbell's Soups to La Choy Chinese dinners. In the middle of the complex, in a building behind a bronze statue of Ronald Reagan, down the hall from the world's largest private commodity trading floor, Dwayne Orville Andreas runs the world.

"Tell me," Andreas says to his number two man, who has just returned from a tour of the company's plants in Eastern Europe, "what do they do for us in Bulgaria? Do they fix the prices? Or is there some kind of a free market?"

This type of brashness typifies Andreas and his company, whether the issue is possible price-fixing in Bulgaria or influence-peddling in Washington. For no other U.S. company is so reliant on politicians and governments to butter its bread. From the postwar food-aid programs that opened new markets in the Third World to the subsidies for corn, sugar, and ethanol that are now under attack as "corporate welfare," ADM's bottom line has always been interwoven with public policy. To reinforce this relationship, Andreas has contributed impressively to the campaigns of politicians, from Richard Nixon and Hubert Humphrey to Bill Clinton and Bob Dole.

Standing just 5-foot-4 and raised a Mennonite, Andreas is a 77-year-old grandfather who, out of the context of his corporate empire, could easily be mistaken for a man of much more modest standing and concerns. This image vanishes, however, when he starts issuing opinions.

Sitting behind a lunch of soy burgers, soy taco meat, and soy cheese dessert, Andreas announces that global capitalism is a delusion. "There isn't one grain of anything in the world that is sold in a free market. Not one! The only place you see a free market is in the speeches of politicians. People who are not in the Midwest do not understand that this is a socialist country."

It might seem odd that a man with personal assets well into nine figures would be so quick to hoist the red flag of socialism over the American heartland. But Andreas is essentially right. Agriculture is the last industry where the U.S. government so routinely sets prices and determines production levels, a complex arena in which doing business often has more to do with influencing legislation than with responding to supply and demand. Prospering in this environment is ADM's forte.

"We're the biggest [food and agriculture] company in the world," Andreas explains. <h33>"How is the government going to run without people like us?</h3> We make 35 percent of the bread in this country, and that much of the margarine, and cooking oil, and all the other things."

ADM is indeed a Goliath of world food production (it calls itself the "supermarket to the world"), with 1994 reported sales of $11.3 billion and profits of $484 million. Its total stock value is $9.7 billion, $417 million of which belongs to Andreas, or is held by him in a trust for his offspring.

For all this, though, ADM still functions like an overgrown mom-and-pop outfit. Four Andreases are senior executives in the company. Another serves on the board. Vice President Howard Buffett (son of investment guru Warren Buffett) seems to be treated like family--he's called "Howie" around the boardroom.

When I spoke with Andreas and two of his sons, they were all clearly uncomfortable dealing with a reporter. Michael Andreas said, only half-jokingly, "I never knew what a reporter looked like."

In addition to the executives' devotion to anonymity, the company markets no products under its own name, so ADM is familiar to most people only through the ads it runs on shows like "The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour." But ADM products are present in literally thousands of items found in supermarkets, liquor stores, even gas stations. In addition to milling much of the country's flour and manufacturing margarines and oils for such big-name brands as Crisco and Mazola, ADM processes ingredients found in such products as Nabisco Cheese Nips, Life cereal, and Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.

ADM's protein enhancers are common in pet foods, and its texturized vegetable protein is the stuff burritos and meatless burgers are made of. If you look at the side of a can of Coca-Cola you will see that ADM corn sweetener is the second ingredient listed, after water. If you tank up on gasohol, the odds are 60 percent that the ethanol in the blend is made by ADM. And if you decide to get tanked on martinis, you will find that ADM is also the nation's largest producer of the grain alcohol used to make gin, vodka, and liqueurs.

"Did somebody dream there is some way that the government doesn't need us?" Andreas continues. "What in the hell would they do with the farm program without us?"

For all ADM's size, the question now is not whether the government can survive without ADM but whether ADM can survive without the government. Three subsidies that the company relies on are now being targeted by watchdogs ranging from Ralph Nader to the libertarian Cato Institute.

The first subsidy is the Agriculture Department's corn-price support program. Despite ADM's close association with corn, this is the least important subsidy to the company. In the short run, ADM might actually benefit if this program is cut back since it might reduce the price the company pays for raw corn. But over time, the lack of a government regulation could lead to wild price fluctuations that would make long-term planning difficult for the company.

Of more benefit to ADM is the Agriculture Department's sugar program. The program runs like a mini-OPEC: setting prices, limiting production, and forcing Americans to spend $1.4 billion per year more for sugar, according to the General Accounting Office. The irony is that, aside from a small subsidiary in Metairie, La., ADM has no interest in sugar. Its concern is to keep sugar prices high to prevent Coke and all the other ADM customers that replaced cane sugar with corn sweeteners from switching back. "The sugar program acts as an umbrella for them," says Tom Hammer, president of the Sweetener Users Association. "It protects them from economic competition."

The third subsidy that ADM depends on is the 54-cent-per-gallon tax credit the federal government allows to refiners of the corn-derived ethanol used in auto fuel. For this subsidy, the federal government pays $3.5 billion over five years. Since ADM makes 60 percent of all the ethanol in the country, the government is essentially contributing $2.1 billion to ADM's bottom line. No other subsidy in the federal government's box of goodies is so concentrated in the hands of a single company.

Robert Shapiro, author of a corporate welfare report for the Progressive Policy Institute, describes ADM's federally supported journey this way: "ADM begins by buying the corn at subsidized prices. Then it uses the corn to make corn sweeteners, which are subsidized by the sugar program. Then it uses the remainder for the big subsidy, which is ethanol."

The grease--or perhaps oleo--that helps keep these kinds of programs going is the money Andreas, his family, his company, and his company's subsidiaries provide politicians who have influence over agricultural policy. During the 1992 election, Andreas gave more than $1.4 million in "soft money" (which goes to party organizations rather than individual candidates, and is exempt from limits) and $345,650 more in contributions to congressional and senatorial candidates, using multiple donors in his family and his companies. In the nonpresidential 1994 election, the company and its people gave $656,768 in soft money and another $224,170 in contributions to individual candidates. More recently, Speaker Newt Gingrich's GOPAC received at least $70,000 from Andreas. (Gingrich has released the names of individual donors, but not yet of corporate ones.) "These guys are state-of-the-art," says Fred Wertheimer, the longtime Common Cause president who recently stepped down. "They play this game to the hilt."

ADM's next challenge is the 1996 presidential race. President Clinton has been extraordinarily generous

to ADM click to show

, last year pushing through a mandate that 30 percent of the gasoline sold in the nation's most polluted cities contain ethanol products by 1996--and receiving a $100,000 check at essentially the same time. (Andreas insists the timing was coincidental.) Sen. Phil Gramm has not shown up on ADM's radar screen yet, but the company has begun to show up on his. Last summer, Gramm stunned his home-state oil companies by stalling on his position on the ethanol mandate. Although he eventually announced that he would support the oil companies against the mandate, he made a point of stating that there was really no good way to vote.

ADM's ultimate presidential candidate, though, is Bob Dole, who has long been one of ethanol's biggest champions. He promoted the 54-cent subsidy and helped keep it from applying to methanol as well. In 1980 he sponsored a tariff on imported alcohol fuels. During the 1990 Clean Air Act debate and the 1992 national energy strategy debate, he pushed pro-ethanol amendments. Dole also has close personal ties with Andreas. Andreas contributes to Dole's foundation for helping the disabled and frequently vacations with him, sometimes providing his own airplane for the trips. In 1982, Andreas helped expedite Dole's purchase of a condominium in the Sea View Hotel in Bal Harbour, Fla. Sea View is managed by an Andreas-owned company, and Andreas also has a condo in the building. Other past and present Sea View tenants include former Tennessee Senator Howard Baker, the late House Speaker Tip O'Neill, television journalist David Brinkley, and ADM board member and Washington superlawyer Robert Strauss.

Andreas has a long history of political philanthropy. In a recently released deposition, Richard Nixon's secretary, Rose Mary Woods, recalled a 1972 personal visit from Andreas in which he delivered an unmarked envelope containing $100,000 in $100 bills. The cash spent a year or so in a White House safe before Nixon, with the Watergate investigation closing in around him, decided to give it back.

Another $25,000 of Andreas' money, however, was traced to a bank account used by the Watergate burglars. This was a revelation--and no doubt a disappointment--to Nixon's presidential opponent, Hubert Humphrey, who had been close friends with Andreas for years. The two, neighbors in Minneapolis in the 1940s and 1950s, had traveled the world together promoting food-aid programs. (Both the Watergate money and the envelope full of cash came at an inopportune time. Andreas had just been indicted, though never convicted, for making illegal campaign contributions.)

Andreas portrays his large gifts as a necessity to silence the pleas of powerful people. Often, he says, solicitations come through someone affiliated with a major ADM customer. Take the $100,000 check to Clinton, says Andreas. The solicitation came from Vernon Jordan, Clinton's transition chief and golfing buddy--and a member of the board of ADM customer Sara Lee. "What are you going to say to Vernon Jordan: 'We've decided to quit you guys'? Of course, I gave him the money."

These protestations leave ADM's detractors unimpressed. "If Mr. Andreas thinks this whole system is a political shakedown, then he should join us in fighting for campaign reform," says Common Cause's Wertheimer.

Recently ADM has been sending signals it wants to spend more of its time and energy seeking greener pastures abroad. Whether this is because Andreas sees an end to the corporate welfare gravy train here, or simply because the growth potential is greater abroad is not clear. But ADM claims to have plants in every single former Warsaw Pact country, is selling ever-increasing amounts of food to China, and is working hand in glove with the European Union.

But the most intriguing--and perhaps most ominous--push ADM is making is in biotechnology. Instead of having to buy soybeans, the company wants to make its own protein in giant vats that are the functional equivalent of cow stomachs. If ADM can pull this off, Andreas might not be so upset when he finds out that Bulgaria doesn't fix prices. With a monopoly on human-engineered protein, ADM will be able to fix its own.

Dan Carney is a freelance writer based in Washington, D.C.

Quote:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpag...gewanted=print
January 26, 1999
Top Archer Daniels Midland Executive Steps Down
By KURT EICHENWALD

Dwayne O. Andreas, who directed the transformation of the Archer Daniels Midland Corporation from a modest regional grain processor to a global agribusiness giant, yesterday stepped down as chairman of the company after more than a quarter of a century at the helm.

Mr. Andreas, who will remain tied to the company as chairman emeritus and a member of the board, was succeeded by his nephew, G. Allen Andreas, who has served as chief executive of the company for almost two years.

Wall Street analysts had widely expected the succession, a fact that in itself may be the final testament to the influence retained by Dwayne Andreas, long one of the most powerful and politically connected executives in America.

Over the last four years, Mr. Andreas saw his hopes of turning the corporate reins over to his son Michael shatter amid a price-fixing scandal. That scandal, which resulted in the conviction of Michael and two other executives on Federal antitrust charges, raised questions among some institutional shareholders about the future role of the Andreas family in the company.

But Mr. Andreas, who is now 80 years old, threw his influence behind his nephew, a respected executive who had won plaudits from his efforts to build Archer Daniel's business in Europe. By 1997, with the approval of company directors, Dwayne Andreas turned the job of chief executive over to Allen, telling friends that he intended to continue as chairman for a year or two.

Since that time, analysts said, Dwayne Andreas has been taking less and less of a role in the daily operations of the company, ceding those duties to his nephew. In essence, these analysts said, yesterday's announcement merely formalizes the role established in recent years.

''I call it a change in form, but not substance,'' said Leonard Teitelbaum, a managing director and analyst with Merrill Lynch & Company.

With his new duties, Dwayne Andreas will continue exerting an enormous level of influence at the company. ''Anybody who thinks that Dwayne Andreas is going to try out for captain of his shuffleboard team is sadly mistaken,'' Mr. Teitelbaum said. ''He is too big an influence in worldwide agriculture.''

In an interview, Allen Andreas said that he expects to continue working closely with his uncle. ''It's a great opportunity for both of us,'' he said. ''He and I have been close associates, and I expect to continue to use his wise advice and counsel.''

Dwayne Andreas's decision to step down crystallized over the Christmas holidays, according to friends and directors. ''He just decided it was time,'' said Robert Strauss, an Archer Daniels director and former chairman of the Democratic Party. ''I don't think he had to wrestle with it. He just woke up one day and it felt like the right thing to do.''

According to participants in yesterday's board meeting, the votes to accept the resignation and name a new chairman were followed by several directors offering plaudits to Dwayne Andreas. Mr. Strauss praised him for his ability to move so easily through different worlds -- agricultural, political and international. Andrew Young, the former United Nations Representative, told of Mr. Andreas's anonymous contributions of money to rebuild black churches when they were being subjected to arson.

Directors and analysts said that the transfer of power to a new generation should be particularly important now, as falling margins are creating new challenges for agriculture companies. ''Allen is more youthful,'' Mr. Webb said in an interview, ''And that vigor is a positive thing for us right now with all the dynamics that are happening in the agricultural industry.''

Dwayne Andreas, who a company spokeswoman said was not available for comment, has been part of the industry since childhood. The son of Mennonite farmers, he helped build a family feed company, and later joined Cargill Inc. as an executive. Long before globalization became the mantra of corporate America, he pushed agricultural companies to seek new markets overseas -- indeed, a dispute about his desire to seek new business in the then Soviet Union contributed to his departure from Cargill.

He joined Archer Daniels in 1965, and within five years, was named chairman and chief executive. Over the decades that followed, Mr. Andreas built the company's financial fortunes and political influence. Mr. Andreas considered courting politicians as part of his job. With an ease that bred envy among other corporations, Mr. Andreas helped navigate Archer Daniels between the Republicans and Democrats while helping to form this country's agricultural policies.

Renowned for generosity in political contributions, the company, Mr. Andreas and his family forged ties with politicians from Hubert Humphrey to Ronald Reagan; Bill Clinton to Newt Gingrich. In the 1972 campaign, it was $25,000 contributed to the Nixon campaign from Dwayne Andreas that ended up in the bank account of a Watergate burglar.

The price-fixing scandal arose in 1995, when Federal agents raided the company's headquarters in Decatur, Ill. It soon emerged that a senior executive, Mark Whitacre, had been working as an informant for the Government, secretly taping price-fixing meetings.

In 1996, the company admitted fixing prices for two commodities, and agreed to pay a record $100 million fine.

Quote:

http://instruct1.cit.cornell.edu/cou...20Whitacre.htm
HEADLINE: Three Sentenced in Archer Daniels Midland Case

BYLINE: By KURT EICHENWALD

DATELINE: CHICAGO, July 9

BODY:
Three former executives of the Archer Daniels Midland Company, including the son of its former chairman, Dwayne Andreas, were sentenced today to terms ranging from two to two and a half years in prison for their roles in a worldwide scheme to fix prices of a feed additive manufactured by the company.

Michael Andreas, the former vice chairman and heir apparent at the company, and Terrance Wilson, the retired chief of its corn processing division, were sentenced to two years and ordered to pay the maximum fine of $350,000 each. A third former executive, Mark Whitacre, was sentenced to two and a half years, but not ordered to pay a fine. Mr. Whitacre, who is already serving nine years in prison for illegally taking millions of dollars from Archer Daniels, was ordered to serve 20 months of the new sentence on top of his current term.

The sentences handed down by Federal Judge Blanche Manning added a new twist to a series of events that have bedeviled the case from the beginning: Mr. Whitacre, who received the longest sentence, was also the Government informant who alerted Federal investigators to the price-fixing conspiracy in 1992.

In a ruling that perplexed prosecutors, Judge Manning determined that Mr. Whitacre was a manager of the conspiracy, which under the Federal guidelines for sentencing requires an increase in his prison term. But she ruled that neither Mr. Andreas nor Mr. Wilson, who prosecutors contended were the masterminds of the scheme, had controlling roles. Judge Manning did not explain the reasons for her decision.

The three men were convicted last September of conspiring with Japanese and Korean competitors to fix the price of the feed additive lysine, and to assign each company its production volume.

Neither Mr. Andreas nor Mr. Wilson showed any reaction to the sentence. Mr. Whitacre was sentenced by telephone. The men had faced maximum sentences of three years in prison.

The case has had an enormous impact on Archer Daniels, whose influence extends to almost every grocery store aisle. For decades, the grain giant was run as a virtual family fiefdom under the iron-fisted control of Dwayne Andreas, one of the nation's most politically powerful executives, who is known to Presidents and prime ministers alike.

But as details of the criminal investigation of the company emerged -- as well as evidence of the involvement in the conspiracy of an Andreas family member -- the company was placed under enormous pressure to become more open and responsive to shareholders. In 1996, the company pleaded guilty to price fixing and paid a $100 million fine. Dwayne Andreas has since retired, turning the reins of the company over to his nephew, G. Allen Andreas.

Prosecutors praised today's sentences, saying that they underscored the significance of the crime.

"This is a particularly reprehensible crime that victimized people throughout the world," said James Griffin, a lead prosecutor in the case.

The sentence, he said, "sends a very serious deterrent message to those who may consider engaging in this kind of criminal activity."

Nonetheless, the prosecutors expressed disappointment at Judge Manning's ruling that neither Mr. Andreas nor Mr. Wilson was in charge of the conspiracy, and some confusion about why she held that Mr. Whitacre was.

"I'm not quite sure why the judge did that," Scott Lassar, the United States Attorney for Chicago, said when asked about Judge Manning's ruling on Mr. Whitacre.

He added that the Government had asked for all three executives to be deemed managers of the conspiracy, and that Mr. Whitacre was the only defendant who did not object to that designation.

The puzzlement about the ruling stems in part from the evidence presented at trial. Mr. Whitacre was only liable for his actions during the time before he informed the Government of the scheme. Based on the trial evidence, only two price-fixing meetings took place in that period, and Mr. Whitacre took a back seat to Mr. Wilson in both instances.

Bill Walker, a lawyer for Mr. Whitacre, said that he was stunned by the sentence. "I'm taken aback by it," he said. "I'm still in the blizzard, trying to figure this out." Lawyers for Mr. Andreas and Mr. Wilson said that they were disappointed by the outcome, but that they planned to appeal the verdict.

Mr. Whitacre first alerted the Government to price fixing at Archer Daniels in 1992. For the next two and a half years, he worked as a Government informant, secretly recording meetings with competitors and conversations at the highest reaches of the company.

Soon after raids on Archer Daniels in 1995, Mr. Whitacre was discredited as a witness, and he eventually lost his immunity from prosecution when it was disclosed that he had been illegally taking millions of dollars from the company, even while working as an informant. Mr. Whitacre contended that the money was provided as part of an under-the-table bonus plan at the company, but Government investigators concluded that was not true. In 1997, Mr. Whitacre pleaded guilty to fraud and was sentenced to prison.

At yesterday's hearing, Mr. Andreas spoke publicly for the first time since the investigation began. Reading from a statement, he portrayed himself as having been blindsided by new Government interpretations of antitrust rules.

"I love this country, your honor, and I thought I knew its rules," Mr. Andreas told Judge Manning. "I did not want to commit a crime and I did not think that I had committed a crime."

But Government prosecutors dismissed that notion. They pointed to a videotape of a meeting between executives from Archer Daniels and Ajinimoto, a Japanese competitor, that was shown at the trial. In the tape, made in October 1993, Mr. Andreas directed an effort to allocate shares of the lysine market in the coming year, a critical element of a price-fixing conspiracy.

Before his sentencing, Mr. Wilson made no attempt to deny his responsibility. "When you find yourself in a hole, quit digging, and I have no intention of making it deeper and wider," he said to Judge Manning. "I accept total and complete responsibility for my actions."

Quote:

http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-241.html
A Case Study In Corporate Welfare

by James Bovard

James Bovard is an associate policy analyst with the Cato Institute. His most recent book is Shakedown: How the Government Screws You from A to Z (Viking, 1995).

Executive Summary

The Archer Daniels Midland Corporation (ADM) has been the most prominent recipient of corporate welfare in recent U.S. history. ADM and its chairman Dwayne Andreas have lavishly fertilized both political parties with millions of dollars in handouts and in return have reaped billion-dollar windfalls from taxpayers and consumers. Thanks to federal protection of the domestic sugar industry, ethanol subsidies, subsidized grain exports, and various other programs, ADM has cost the American economy billions of dollars since 1980 and has indirectly cost Americans tens of billions of dollars in higher prices and higher taxes over that same period. At least 43 percent of ADM's annual profits are from products heavily subsidized or protected by the American government. Moreover, every $1 of profits earned by ADM's corn sweetener operation costs consumers $10, and every $1 of profits earned by its ethanol operation costs taxpayers $30

One of the most politically charged debates in Washington revolves around business subsidies known as "corporate welfare." A number of policy organizations have published studies examining the corporate welfare phenomenon: what qualifies as corporate welfare, how much it costs taxpayers, and how much it damages the economy. This study examines the dynamics of corporate welfare somewhat differently by investigating ADM as a classic case study of how those subsidies are obtained, how the welfare state encourages such "rent seeking," and how such practices fundamentally corrupt the political life of a nation. Congress's expressed desire to foster a free marketplace cannot be taken seriously until ADM's corporate hand is removed from the federal till.

Introduction

ADM is certainly the nation's most arrogant welfare recipient. .....

ADM is the tenth worst corporate air polluter in the US:

Quote:

http://www.peri.umass.edu/Toxic-100-Table.265.0.html
THE TOXIC 100: Top Corporate Air Polluters in the United States

Largest corporations ranked by toxic score, 2002

>>Toxic 100 Press Release

>> For details on how this table was prepared, see Technical Notes.

>> Search detailed company reports.

Complete responses & non-responses by Top 10 companies and rejoinders
by PERI, moderated by the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre....

....and there is another US "agri-monster", privately held Cargill:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cargill

Seaver · 12-01-2007, 04:41 PM

Very good post Roach.

I fully support what they do so long as their economy can keep it up. If their government can make up the money spent on said subsidies by exportation of food to neighboring countries than they have a great model for others to follow.

I, for now, remain skeptical. I fear this will be like Nasser's plan to pay for the college education of anyone who wishes to attend, and then employing said people. While greatly successful at first, the cost of the program slowly sapped any economic strength from the country over time.

Ustwo · 12-01-2007, 08:47 PM

Moral of the story, giving fertilizer to poor farmers who were on the verge of starvation only 4 years ago improved crop yields in a non-industrial system in a year of good weather.

This is nice, and good for them, who knows how long it shall last, but this is a great victory for redistribution of wealth?

Great, sign me up.

Skutch · 12-01-2007, 09:57 PM

Mountains of corn to go with roasted mice and poached locust.

Willravel · 12-01-2007, 11:18 PM

Socialist policy wins again. I am a great fan of well researched and implemented subsidies when they are necessary, and it's clear that this case is an excellent example of how well things can go when a government realizes that giving back to their citizens, in the citizen's best interest is the best policy. I hope more countries decide to think for themselves instead of letting the World Bank or WTO lie to their faces about what's best for them.

The more impoverished countries think for themselves and work in the interests of their citizens, the less third would countries there will be.

Charlatan · 12-01-2007, 11:41 PM

This isn't a "win" for socialist policy per se. Rather, it is an indication that the key is a balanced system. Neither a completely free market, nor a completely planned market would be an ideal.

host · 12-02-2007, 12:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

This isn't a "win" for socialist policy per se. Rather, it is an indication that the key is a balanced system. Neither a completely free market, nor a completely planned market would be an ideal.

So, it's got nothing to do with the worldwide influence (domination ?) of US corporatism (government welfare subsidies to companies like ADM) and US corporate executive criminality and collusion with corrupt or misguided politicians in high places in state and federal government, resulting in price fixing of food products and food growing staples like seed and fertilizer? Seed, for example, is intentionally designed by US agribusiness suppliers to yield crops with infertile seed.

The subsistence farmers of Malawi should not all be growing corn, or maize. It is the primary diet of their children from the moment they are weaned, and it <a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?db=pubmed&uid=14734876&cmd=showdetailview&indexed=google">stunts their growth</a> from the outset because it is lacking as a "be all, end all" nutritional staple.

Malawi has a fragile ecosystem with huge lake Malawi containing the world's greatest diversity of fish species in one location. The country is one of the poorest and most HIV plagued, per capita, in the world.

This story seems to be about what is best for US agribusiness, whether it is dumping subsidized, surplus food in food aid programs, or selling artificial fertilizer and genetically engineered corn seed to a country that cannot afford to purchase it or cope with the effects of it on it's ecosystem and it's peoples' long term nutrition.

They should be encouraged to grow indigenous crops that are drought resistant and nutritionally diverse, and sustained by compost produced, natural fertilizer, and planted with seed that is not infertile and expensive.

We're from the country with the corporations that have kept selling pesticides banned here, to foreign countries, and push tobacco products, using advertising and other promotions long illegal in the US, to attempt to addict young foreign residents.

Around the world, we export our corporatist goals in a "slow mo" version of what our corporatist alliance has accomplished in Iraq....the result is that we distort their economies and societies to "soften them up" as new targets for out products, which they mostly do not need and cannot sustainably afford.

Charlatan · 12-02-2007, 01:09 AM

Host... you really have done your research, and it's pretty clear you have a lot of passion for the subjects in which you engage. I have to wonder if your approach isn't one that makes your interlocutors feel just a little stupid and belittled. I wonder if you were to take another approach of engagement with other members of this board that you wouldn't get a better response.

If you were to have a look at my post I was making a comment that doesn't even come close to touching on the subject you have expounded upon above. I was simply trying to point out that socialism per se is not the answer, nor is a free market system.

You see, I might actually agree with you, but the way in which you have presented your position immediately suggests (to me in any case) a level of accusation and anger that does nothing to win me over to your position (and I will repeat that I am not entirely in disagreement with your position to start with).

I've said it before and I am determined to say it again until you hear me... you really need to take another approach to how you engage with people. You are not going to win people over to your way of thinking if you continue to do engage in the way you are.

rlbond86 · 12-02-2007, 02:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

Host... you really have done your research, and it's pretty clear you have a lot of passion for the subjects in which you engage. I have to wonder if your approach isn't one that makes your interlocutors feel just a little stupid and belittled. I wonder if you were to take another approach of engagement with other members of this board that you wouldn't get a better response.

If you were to have a look at my post I was making a comment that doesn't even come close to touching on the subject you have expounded upon above. I was simply trying to point out that socialism per se is not the answer, nor is a free market system.

You see, I might actually agree with you, but the way in which you have presented your position immediately suggests (to me in any case) a level of accusation and anger that does nothing to win me over to your position (and I will repeat that I am not entirely in disagreement with your position to start with).

I've said it before and I am determined to say it again until you hear me... you really need to take another approach to how you engage with people. You are not going to win people over to your way of thinking if you continue to do engage in the way you are.

Off topic, but I completely agree. Host's practices of submitting enormous comments with several quoted articles, followed by an accusation, definitely come off as more than arrogant. I honestly never read anything he says anymore; who has the patience to wade through the multiple pages of stuff he throws together in EVERY POST?

Back on topic, for the OP: How exactly do you define neoliberalism in the context of the fertilizer subsidies? I'm finding it difficult to follow your question exactly. I'd love to chime in but I find myself a bit confused

What would a neoliberal do in this situation?

Charlatan · 12-02-2007, 03:52 AM

rlbond, thank you for some constructive feedback on posting style. I really do appreciate it. You see, I find a lot of what Host posts to be amazingly informative. What I am taking issue with is the way in which it is presented.

Back to the topic at hand...

Here is a definition of neoliberalism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism

The neoliberals, as I understand them, would argue that subsidies of all kinds should be removed. Period.

They have advocated time and again for deregulation and open markets.

As far as I can see, open markets are generally a good thing and for nations such as China, India and South East Asia, that have embraced increasingly open markets it has served them well. They are increasingly democratic, their population's general incomes are coming up and thriving.

Nations, such as those in the Middle East, that are increasingly closed are economically stunted and are hotbeds for fundamentalism (fundamentalism being the purveyor of the ultimate in closed markets).

That said, there are situations where some subsidies and regulations can help to grow sectors of individual economies as well as protect from illegal activities.

Ustwo · 12-02-2007, 07:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

Host... you really have done your research, and it's pretty clear you have a lot of passion for the subjects in which you engage. I have to wonder if your approach isn't one that makes your interlocutors feel just a little stupid and belittled. I wonder if you were to take another approach of engagement with other members of this board that you wouldn't get a better response..

No, not at all.

Quote:

Maleta K, Kuittinen J, Duggan MB, Briend A, Manary M, Wales J, Kulmala T, Ashorn P.

College of Medicine, University of Malawi, Blantyre, Malawi.

OBJECTIVE: Maize and soy flour mixes are often used in the treatment of moderate malnutrition in Malawi. Their efficacy has not been formally evaluated. A recently developed ready-to-use food (RTUF) effectively promotes growth among severely malnourished children. The authors compared the effect of maize and soy flour with that of RTUF in the home treatment of moderately malnourished children. METHODS: Sixty-one underweight, stunted children 42 to 60 months of age were recruited in rural Malawi, in southeastern Africa. They received either RTUF or maize and soy flour for 12 weeks. Both supplements provided 2 MJ (500Kcal) of energy daily but had different energy and nutrient densities. Outcome variables were weight and height gain and dietary intake. RESULTS: Before intervention, the mean dietary intake and weight and height gain were similar in the two groups. During the supplementation phase, the consumption of staple food fell among children receiving maize and soy flour but not among those receiving RTUF. There was thus higher intake of energy, fat, iron, and zinc in the RTUF group. Both supplements resulted in modest weight gain, but the effect lasted longer after RTUF supplementation. Height gain was not affected in either group. Periodic 24-hour dietary recalls suggested that the children received only 30% and 43%, respectively, of the supplementary RTUF and maize and soy flour provided. CONCLUSIONS: RTUF is an acceptable alternative to maize and soy flour for dietary supplementation of moderately malnourished children. Approaches aimed at increasing the consumption of supplementary food by the selected recipients are needed.

He links a story that doesn't support what he is saying. Its a common theme with him. What is says is that another supplement BESIDES the usual corn/soy flower mix works just as well.

Maybe he just doesn't understand the science, I obviously don't do this for every post, I do have a life, this one just happened to be mercifully short on links.

At any rate, no one promotes only one type of food/crop in agriculture, as that will lead to some issues. Rice, corn, wheat, whatever, isn't enough by it self. It also has nothing to do with the issue at hand.

Sure it would be nice to have local crops with survive the best, provide all the nutrients you could ever want, and they could sell for some cash. Then again we have an extremely high yield type of corp, designed by directly and indirectly for 1000's of years, which can be stored almost indefinitely if properly treated in corn.

Places like Africa which have been prematurely introduced to western medicine need western levels of production to avoid starvation, and it can and has been done in places. Africa's enemy is its corrupt politics more than drought.

Edit:Oh and the main issue with the OP isn't that giving away fertilizer at a lower than market price can increase crop yield. Its that its not currently a sustainable system. It makes the system reliant on outside cash. So either they start 'taxing' by taking some surplus corn to pay for the system, or they rely on someone else paying for it. Otherwise what happens if that coupon, which they apparently don't have enough of, is taken away? The logical thing is you still want to develop the local fertilizer market, the problem is of course a system like this will normally destroy it.

Edit:Edit: I have been poking around that site about the maze in their related links. Ironically several are promoting the use of locally grown corn to fight malnutrition, and what type of corn works best. Interesting stuff.

host · 12-02-2007, 08:08 AM

It is well established that Malawi is a mess, and foreign interference, no matter how well intentioned, is a major factor:

Quote:

http://www.eufic.org/web/article.asp...d=16&artid=103

The origins of maize: the puzzle of pellagra
30_3_bigThe spread of maize as a staple food from the fifteenth century resulted in a devastating nutrient-deficiency disease called pellagra. The causation of pellagra posed a medical puzzle for centuries until twentieth century scientists unravelled the mystery.
The spread of maize

Columbus discovered maize in the New World in 1492 and brought it back to Spain, from where it spread throughout Europe, to North Africa, the Middle East, India and China. Maize (Zea mays, or corn as it is known in some countries) is the only cereal crop that has an American origin and which is now a principal cereal crop in tropical and subtropical regions throughout the world. The increasing use of maize as a staple food reflected the much higher yields per hectare, compared with wheat, rye and barley. Because maize was cheap, it became the dominant food and main source of dietary energy and protein for poor people, particularly those in rural and underprivileged segments of society.
Pellagra or "the sour skin" disease

Unfortunately, wherever maize went, a disease called "pellagra" was sure to follow. The connection between maize and pellagra was first described by Casal in Spain in 1735.When it became an endemic disease in northern Italy, Francesco Frapoli of Milan named it 'pelle agra" (pelle, skin; agra, sour). Clinically, the disease is identified by the three Ds-dermatitis, diarrhoea and dementia-and if untreated, pellagra typically leads to death in four or five years.

For years, the lack of medical knowledge and the earlier suspicion that pellagra was caused by some hypothetical toxin in maize, or as a result of infectious agents or a genetic condition, led to major pellagra epidemics in Europe and the United States.

The puzzle started to be solved when it was noted that pellagra was rare in Mexico despite widespread consumption of maize. The reason appeared to lay in the different way in which the grain was prepared in Mexico.
The people of the Aztec and Mayan civilisations softened the corn to make it edible with an alkaline solution-limewater. This process liberated the bound niacin (also known as niacytin) and the important amino acid tryptophan, from which niacin can be formed, making both "bioavailable" for digestion.

The ancient practice of soaking the maize meal overnight in lime water before making tortillas was never transferred to those countries in the Old World to which maize travelled or to communities subsisting largely on maize as a staple food. This almost invariably led to the niacin deficiency disease, pellagra.

The knowledge of the chemistry of this process ultimately explained a long-standing nutritional puzzle. Much of the credit for demonstrating that pellagra is a nutrient deficiency disease belongs to Goldberger and his colleagues, who between 1913 and 1930 proved that the disease in humans and 'black-tongue' (a niacin-deficiency disease in dogs) could be cured by the pellagra-preventing (P-P) factors nicotinic acid and niacin....

Quote:

http://www.biotech-info.net/divided_over_diet.html
"Divided over a diet for the poor: SCIENCE MALNUTRITION"

Michela Wrong
Financial Times (London)
September 8, 2000

Aid workers in Africa are familiar with the sight: children with orange-tinted hair and distended bellies, lying listless in villages seemingly blessed with abundant food.

Victims of malnutrition rather than hunger, the children are dying because they have been weaned early from their mother's milk and placed on gruel diets that lack the protein needed to build muscle and bone.

So when scientists came up with a maize variety that boasted higher levels of essential amino acids - a maize, incidentally, that was produced by conventional breeding, not genetic engineering - you might have expected universal rejoicing.

But while the two researchers who played a large role developing Quality Protein Maize, known as QPM, were yesterday named winners of this year's World Food Prize, some promoters of economic development in poor countries regard the breakthrough with something bordering on suspicion.

Their caution sheds light on why the debate over the rights and wrong of genetically modified crops has become so heated. Wrapped up within the anti-GM stance adopted by environmental groups and development agencies are issues unconnected to fears of horizontal gene-transfer or pollen contamination.

Rather, they concern what are perceived as top-down approaches, or "technofixes", and they date further back than the recent furore over genetic engineering - back, indeed, to the Green Revolution itself.

"GM has become a lightning rod for other worries about agro-industrial complexes, corporate control and the undermining of local knowledge," says Professor Jules Pretty, an agricultural specialist at the University of Essex. "A lot of these concerns are not directly related to GM, but they are being expressed in that form."

Many of these issues got a recent public airing with the invention of Golden Rice, which was genetically engineered to contain beta-carotene, a yellow compound that the body converts into vitamin A. Its nutritional absence kills or blinds millions each year.

Although QPM comes free of the GM tag - a label that raises the prospect of regulatory hurdles and legal wrangling over intellectual property rights - it shares several charac- teristics with Golden Rice.

The maize traces its roots back to the 1960s, when a PhD student at Purdue University in the US discovered that two maize varieties from the Andean highlands, characterised by opaque kernels, contained large amounts of the amino acids lysine and tryptophan.

Traced to the gene opaque-2, the improved protein quotient was seized on as a weapon against kwashiorkor, a condition which distends the belly, and marasmus, a wasting disease.

But initial enthusiasm was short-lived. In the field, opaque-2's yields were 20 per cent lower than those of conventional varieties. The maize was soft and chalky, making it susceptible to insects and viruses. Kernels rotted in storage.....

Quote:

http://knowledge.cta.int/en/content/view/full/2938
Malawi - GM sorghum project to train local scientists

Nation Online (Malawi) 20 April 2006 | A window of opportunity has opened for local agricultural scientists to learn new tricks of fortifying sorghum, thanks to US philanthropists Bill and Melinda Gates who are bankrolling the project. Known as the African Biotechnology Sorghum (ABS), the project is worth US$450 million (about K60 billion), which the Gates couple is pumping through the Gates Foundation. The sorghum initiative is drawing its funding from the foundation’s Grand Challenges for Global Health (GCGH), which seeks to harness the power of science and technology in improving the health of the world’s poorest people.
22/05/2006 ....

http://www.pronutrition.org/archive/200306/msg00009.php
Everyone Can Live Longer and Stronger with Good Nutrition!
HIV/AIDS Best Practices Workshop, 2002

By Stacia M. Nordin, RD, HIV/AIDS Crisis Corps Coordinator US Peace Corps PO Box 208, Lilongwe, tel: 757-657/157, fax: 751-008,
snordin@mw.peacecorps.gov

Nutrition & HIV

.....Planning meals with the Food Groups
The current meal in Malawi consists of a lot of nsima (made with white maize flour) along with a little bit of ndiwo side dish. This meal is eaten over and over again every day, every meal. This eating pattern ('diet') is not helping to boost the immune system because people are eating too much from the Staple group and not enough of the other food groups. This diet provides very few nutrients for the body and leaves the body weak and vulnerable to diseases. In addition, the way the foods are prepared removes most of the nutrients through processing or cooking before the food gets inside our bodies. Another problem in towns is that people tend to eat too much from the Fats and the Animal Foods groups which is also not a healthy diet.

A better meal consists of foods from each of the 6 food groups and uses
different foods for different meals, while processing ad cooking the food to retain the most nutrients. Most people in Malawi (and around the world) need to include more foods from the Vegetables, Fruits, and Legumes & Nuts
Food Groups, which is where we get most of our vitamins that are responsible for fighting diseases. A better meal also means eating less maize and instead including a variety of different Staple foods. This picture shows the proportions of each of the food groups that should be covering our plates - each person is different, but something close to this would be sufficient.

Remember, a wide variety is the key!

Getting the Foods for a Better Diet: What Can We Do?

In order to eat a better diet, we have to start thinking about what we are
doing with our environment. <h3>The emphasis in Malawi for about the last 100 years has been on maize, a crop which is not even native to the culture.
Before maize, Malawi's environment and diet revolved around a wide variety of local fruits, vegetables, nuts, beans, millets, sorghums, other seeds, roots, and various animal foods. The landscape has been converted from a healthy variety of trees, plants, and animals, to one that is merely covered in maize fields. The diversity in the environment is gone so the diversity in our diets is gone, leaving both the environment and the human population unhealthy and at risk for disease.

Although many of the traditional foods are still available, they are
vanishing quickly because of the push to supply maize year-round either by forcing the land to produce it or by bringing in maize aid when the
environment is unable to meet our maize demands. Maize is not the only
culprit, people are becoming more interested in obtaining foreign foods than in giving attention to the abundance of foods right around them.
Expatriates, donors, and aid organizations who come in to 'help' often never take the time to learn about these valuable food resources that are already here.

The local foods that are being crowded out by maize and other foreign foods are often higher in nutrients than foreign foods, can be available with little work, outside inputs, or money, and are delicious!</h3> There are over 500 foods available in Malawi that are able to meet all our nutritional
needs and many people and organizations are trying to revive the knowledge and use of these plants as part of the diet. People are collecting and sharing local seeds and intercropping them in their gardens; focusing on purchasing locally available foods from vendors; capturing and utilizing excess water to reuse for growing local foods and medicines; caring for the soil through reuse of all organic wastes; wisely using all areas around their homes for food production; preparing foods through methods which retain the most nutrients; and changing their diets to include a variety of foods.

Anyone, anywhere around the world can implement these ideas in their lives and contribute to a more sustainable and healthy world....

rlbond86 · 12-02-2007, 10:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

As far as I can see, open markets are generally a good thing and for nations such as China, India and South East Asia, that have embraced increasingly open markets it has served them well. They are increasingly democratic, their population's general incomes are coming up and thriving.

Nations, such as those in the Middle East, that are increasingly closed are economically stunted and are hotbeds for fundamentalism (fundamentalism being the purveyor of the ultimate in closed markets).

That said, there are situations where some subsidies and regulations can help to grow sectors of individual economies as well as protect from illegal activities.

Ok this makes more sense. But of course, history tells us that at times economic controls are very effective: for example, the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 (though that was the reverse of this situation).

host · 12-02-2007, 11:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

No, not at all.

He links a story that doesn't support what he is saying. Its a common theme with him. <h3> What is says is that another supplement BESIDES the usual corn/soy flower mix works just as well.</h3>

Maybe he just doesn't understand the science, I obviously don't do this for every post, I do have a life, this one just happened to be mercifully short on links.

At any rate, no one promotes only one type of food/crop in agriculture, as that will lead to some issues. Rice, corn, wheat, whatever, isn't enough by it [self. It also has nothing to do with the issue at hand.

Sure it would be nice to have local crops with survive the best, provide all the nutrients you could ever want, and they could sell for some cash. Then again we have an extremely high yield type of corp, designed by directly and indirectly for 1000's of years, which can be stored almost indefinitely if properly treated in corn.

Places like Africa which have been prematurely introduced to western medicine need western levels of production to avoid starvation, and it can and has been done in places. Africa's enemy is its corrupt politics more than drought.

Edit:Oh and the main issue with the OP isn't that giving away fertilizer at a lower than market price can increase crop yield. Its that its not currently a sustainable system. It makes the system reliant on outside cash. So either they start 'taxing' by taking some surplus corn to pay for the system, or they rely on someone else paying for it. Otherwise what happens if that coupon, which they apparently don't have enough of, is taken away? The logical thing is you still want to develop the local fertilizer market, the problem is of course a system like this will normally destroy it.

Edit:Edit: I have been poking around that site about the maze in their related links. Ironically several are promoting the use of locally grown corn to fight malnutrition, and what type of corn works best. Interesting stuff.

You didn't read the excerpt, or you didn't grasp that the alternative treatment for malnutrition was more beneficial to the children who consumed it than the maize/soy supplement was:

Quote:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/en...indexed=google

.......METHODS: Sixty-one underweight, stunted children 42 to 60 months of age were recruited in rural Malawi, in southeastern Africa. They received either RTUF or maize and soy flour for 12 weeks. Both supplements provided 2 MJ (500Kcal) of energy daily but had different energy and nutrient densities. Outcome variables were weight and height gain and dietary intake. RESULTS: Before intervention, the mean dietary intake and weight and height gain were similar in the two groups. During the supplementation phase, the consumption of staple food fell among children receiving maize and soy flour <h3>but not among those receiving RTUF. There was thus higher intake of energy, fat, iron, and zinc in the RTUF group. Both supplements resulted in modest weight gain, but the effect lasted longer after RTUF supplementation.</h3> Height gain was not affected in either group. Periodic 24-hour dietary recalls suggested that the children received only 30% and 43%, respectively, of the supplementary RTUF and maize and soy flour provided..........

12-01-2007, 12:09 PM	#2 (permalink)
ottopilot let me be clear Location: Waddy Peytona	edit Last edited by ottopilot; 12-26-2007 at 08:01 PM..

12-01-2007, 01:35 PM	#4 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i take the point concerning inorganic fertilizers, host...i left it to the side of the discussion for the time being mostly because i wanted to focus attention on the effects of state action, in defiance of neoliberal conventional wisdom, in jumpstarting malawian agricultural production---and in particular i wanted to emphasize the tack adopted both in malawi and the nyt piece that what m is doing is what the americans DO not what they SAY. it's hard to tell, based on the nyt piece (and the short bit that you posted as well) what type of production is being underwritten--whether it is monocropping, for example, or more locally oriented, diversified types of production, what mixture of the two, and how state funding is being directed exactly. the downside of the information above is the emphasis on corn alone, which makes me wonder if malawi is imitating exactly the american monocrop-dominant model and subsidy underpinnings. if that is the case, then it is not sustainable, really---but that said, it is still what i said it was vis-a-vis neoliberal ideology--a clear, obvious, straightforward rejection of a way of orienting policy that simply does not work outside the space of modelling exercises and cherry-picked economic data. the us mortage bailout plan is interesting---and to the extent that it points to a parallel gap separating the rhetoric of free markets and the use of state subsidies to address the consequences of policy implemented based on the assumption that this rhetoric is more than just that--- but for purposes here. i would personally prefer to keep it to the side, or explore it in another thread (i know you've tried, sir...): i'd prefer it if the focus here was mostly on southern hemisphere countries, simply because they are the most direct victims of this religious faith in neoliberalism particular to the imf/worldbank nexus, and so are spaces where the failure of policies based on neoliberalism are most obvious (and devastating materially, at least so far)---and data about this is much less present within the media bubble than are problems around american consumer debt levels. also, maintaining the separation of topics directs attention more easily to american agricultural subsidies as a self-evident example of another gap--the one that separates the rhetoric of "the level playing field" and the reality of dumping (with all the attending destruction of food self-sufficiency, which flies in the face of imf/world bank talk talk talk about their "concern for poverty and ending hunger")....it's hard to avoid the conclusion that this "level playing field" means nothing, that it is a thin veneer behind which american economic domination is justified...and that, knowing something of the realities behind these word word words, points to yet another curious gap, the one that separates the articles of faith particular to domestic populist conservatism in the states and the policies undertaken by the political class which claims to represent these articles of faith. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

12-01-2007, 04:41 PM	#6 (permalink)
Seaver Junkie Location: Fort Worth, TX	Very good post Roach. I fully support what they do so long as their economy can keep it up. If their government can make up the money spent on said subsidies by exportation of food to neighboring countries than they have a great model for others to follow. I, for now, remain skeptical. I fear this will be like Nasser's plan to pay for the college education of anyone who wishes to attend, and then employing said people. While greatly successful at first, the cost of the program slowly sapped any economic strength from the country over time. __________________ "Smite the rocks with the rod of knowledge, and fountains of unstinted wealth will gush forth." - Ashbel Smith as he laid the first cornerstone of the University of Texas

12-01-2007, 08:47 PM	#7 (permalink)
Ustwo Pissing in the cornflakes	Moral of the story, giving fertilizer to poor farmers who were on the verge of starvation only 4 years ago improved crop yields in a non-industrial system in a year of good weather. This is nice, and good for them, who knows how long it shall last, but this is a great victory for redistribution of wealth? Great, sign me up. __________________ Agents of the enemies who hold office in our own government, who attempt to eliminate our "freedoms" and our "right to know" are posting among us, I fear.....on this very forum. - host Obama - Know a Man by the friends he keeps.

12-01-2007, 11:41 PM	#10 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	This isn't a "win" for socialist policy per se. Rather, it is an indication that the key is a balanced system. Neither a completely free market, nor a completely planned market would be an ideal. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

12-01-2007, 09:57 PM	#8 (permalink)
Skutch Crazy	Mountains of corn to go with roasted mice and poached locust.

12-01-2007, 11:18 PM	#9 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Socialist policy wins again. I am a great fan of well researched and implemented subsidies when they are necessary, and it's clear that this case is an excellent example of how well things can go when a government realizes that giving back to their citizens, in the citizen's best interest is the best policy. I hope more countries decide to think for themselves instead of letting the World Bank or WTO lie to their faces about what's best for them. The more impoverished countries think for themselves and work in the interests of their citizens, the less third would countries there will be.

12-02-2007, 01:09 AM	#12 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	Host... you really have done your research, and it's pretty clear you have a lot of passion for the subjects in which you engage. I have to wonder if your approach isn't one that makes your interlocutors feel just a little stupid and belittled. I wonder if you were to take another approach of engagement with other members of this board that you wouldn't get a better response. If you were to have a look at my post I was making a comment that doesn't even come close to touching on the subject you have expounded upon above. I was simply trying to point out that socialism per se is not the answer, nor is a free market system. You see, I might actually agree with you, but the way in which you have presented your position immediately suggests (to me in any case) a level of accusation and anger that does nothing to win me over to your position (and I will repeat that I am not entirely in disagreement with your position to start with). I've said it before and I am determined to say it again until you hear me... you really need to take another approach to how you engage with people. You are not going to win people over to your way of thinking if you continue to do engage in the way you are. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

12-02-2007, 03:52 AM	#14 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	rlbond, thank you for some constructive feedback on posting style. I really do appreciate it. You see, I find a lot of what Host posts to be amazingly informative. What I am taking issue with is the way in which it is presented. Back to the topic at hand... Here is a definition of neoliberalism: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoliberalism The neoliberals, as I understand them, would argue that subsidies of all kinds should be removed. Period. They have advocated time and again for deregulation and open markets. As far as I can see, open markets are generally a good thing and for nations such as China, India and South East Asia, that have embraced increasingly open markets it has served them well. They are increasingly democratic, their population's general incomes are coming up and thriving. Nations, such as those in the Middle East, that are increasingly closed are economically stunted and are hotbeds for fundamentalism (fundamentalism being the purveyor of the ultimate in closed markets). That said, there are situations where some subsidies and regulations can help to grow sectors of individual economies as well as protect from illegal activities. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke