International Commodity Policy Research Articles

A welfare analysis of the EC‐ACP sugar protocol

The Sugar Protocol, laid down in the Convention of Lome, has been an established instrument of commodity policy for nearly 20 years. Its basic rule is that the EC imports at guaranteed prices specified quantities of sugar from ACP countries. It is the objective of the article to provide an economic evaluation of the Sugar Protocol. Impacts on prices, trade, export earnings and economic welfare are elaborated. The Sugar Protocol's impacts on the level and instabilty of sugar export earnings are jointly evaluated by computing transfer and risk benefits along the lines of Newbery/Stiglitz. A major conclusion is that the policy has to be evaluated differently from the donor's and the recipient's point of view. The Sugar Protocol induces international income transfers that are untargeted in terms of per capita income. It causes, however, rather strong risk benefits compared with other instruments of international commodity policy and sizeable welfare gains for individual recipient countries.

International commodity policy in transition

Economists have long been questioning the usefulness of the traditional, highly regulatory international commodity policy. In recent years, the failure of this policy has become evident. Could price and earnings stabilisation through price risk management instruments represent a viable alternative?

REVIEWS

Book reviews in this article:BOURKE, A. (ed. Hill, J. and ÓGráda, C.) (1993). The Visitation of God? ‐ The Potato and the Great Irish FamineBUSCH, L., LACY, W. B., BURKHARDT, J. and LACY, L. R. (1991). Plants, Power and Profit: Social, Economic and Ethical Consequences of the New BiotechnologiesCONSTANZA, R. (ed.) (1991). Ecological Economics: The Science and Management of SustainabilityFOSTER, P. (1992). The World Food Problem: Tackling the Causes of Undernutrition in the Third WorldFRIMPONG‐ANSAH, J. H. (1991). The Vampire State in Africa: The Political Economy of Decline in GhanaHERMANN, R., BURGER, K. and SMITH, P. (1993). International Commodity Policy: A Quantitative AnalysisLORRAIM‐SMITH, R. (1993). Computers in Forestry: Use of Spreadsheets. Taunton: Research Studies Press and Chichester: James WileyNOBLE, D. H. and COURSE, C. (1993). Spreadsheets for Agriculture. Harlow, Essex, UK: Longman Scientific and TechnicalANDERSON, J. R. and DE HAAN, C. (eds.) (1992). Public and Private Roles in Agricultural Development: Proceedings of the Twelfth Agricultural Sector SymposiumBELLAMY, M. and GREENSHIELDS, B. (eds.) (1992). Issues in Agricultural Development: Sustainability and Cooperation. International Association of Agricultural Economists Occasional Paper No. 6. AldershotGILES, A. K. (1993). The Provincial Agricultural Economics Service 1945–1968: Its Origins, Form, Demise and LegacyHILL, P., GREEN, B. and EDWARDS, A. (1992). The Costs of Care: The Costs and Benefits of Environmentally Friendly Farming PracticesMILLER, F. A. (ed). (1993). Eastern Europe: Opportunities and Needs for Food and Agriculture. CAS Paper 27OECD (1993) Agricultural and Environmental Policy Integration: Recent Progress and New Directions. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and DevelopmentOECD (1993) Agricultural Policies, Markets and Trade: Monitoring and Outlook 1993. Paris: Organisation for Economic Co‐operation and Development

Commodities in Crisis: The Commodity Crisis of the 1980s and the Political Economy of International Commodity Policies.

Part 1 The commodity crisis and the developing countries: the commodity price collapse of the 1980s the impact on the developing countries raising depressed levels of commodity export earnings instability, stabilization policy, and economic development commodity markets and the world economy. Part 2 International commodity policy: the post-war background the integrated programme for commodities and the common fund negotiations on individual commodities compensatory finance. Part 3 Longer-term issues: the structure and control of international commodity markets technological change and the challenge of synthetics protectionist barriers to commodity trade new trade directions - South-South and East-South diversification. Part 4 The future of international commodity policy: the future of international commodity policy.

Policy Learning and Failure

ABSTRACTMultiple knowledges are available for utilisation in policy choice. The rank ordering of knowledges for use in decisionmaking is thus a fundamental predecision. This article shows how this predecision necessarily constrains the processes associated with a politics of ideas, using cases from American international commodity policy. Even when the supposed preconditions of this sort of politics are present, policy change did not occur when the proposed ideas arose from a knowledge accorded secondary status in policymaking circles. Several implications are discussed for the influence and the study of ideational politics. Ultimately, the politics of ideas, so often portrayed through cases of innovation, may be quite conservative, contained by knowledge hierarchies which reflect prior politicaxl circumstances.

Knowledge Hierarchies and the Politics of Ideas in American International Commodity Policy

ABSTRACTMultiple knowledges are available for utilisation in policy choice. The rank ordering of knowledges for use in decisionmaking is thus a fundamental predecision. This article shows how this predecision necessarily constrains the processes associated with a politics of ideas, using cases from American international commodity policy. Even when the supposed preconditions of this sort of politics are present, policy change did not occur when the proposed ideas arose from a knowledge accorded secondary status in policymaking circles. Several implications are discussed for the influence and the study of ideational politics. Ultimately, the politics of ideas, so often portrayed through cases of innovation, may be quite conservative, contained by knowledge hierarchies which reflect prior political circumstances.

Commodities in crisis: An overview of the main issues

This introductory article provides a general review of some of the main issues facing the world commodity economy in the 1980s, particularly those arising from the dramatic collapse in the foreign exchange earnings of developing countries from their exports of primary commodities. The subject matter covered in this special issue of World Development includes not only the more traditional concerns related to short-term commodity market instability and longer-term issues such as agricultural protectionism, but also the relevance of the linkages between the commodity sector and the rest of the international economic system for the stability of the world economy as a whole. This article covers more aspects of the “commodity problem” than can be considered in detail in the subsequent articles prepared for a single issue of this journal. Nonetheless, the present introduction should make a contribution to identifying useful areas for further research, as well as focusing on some of the options in the field of international commodity policy.

Commodity market stabilization - A comparison of simple and optimal intervention strategies in a model of the world copper market

With the publication of the Brandt report and the Cancun ‘North-South’ summit meeting, international commodity policy has again become an important issue. Commodity stabilisation agreements have been proposed as a means of stabilising producers' incomes and/or redistributing wealth to less developed economies. This paper examines, in the context of a single market, the extent to which prices can be stabilised, the potential costs of such scheme, and whether this redistribution would be achieved. By comparing the bandwidth rules which have been proposed with optimal stabilisation rules, we find that significant stabilisation is possible but expensive and that bandwidth rules are likely to prove inadequate because they cannot anticipate.

Commodity market stabilization: A comparison of simple and optimal intervention strategies in the world copper market

With the publication of the Brandt Report, international commodity policy has again become an important issue. Commodity stabilization agreements have been proposed as a means of stabilizing producers' incomes and/or redistributing wealth to less developed economies. This paper examines, in the context of a single market, the extent to which prices can be stabilized, the potential costs of such a scheme, and whether this redistribution would be achieved. By comparing the bandwidth rules that have been proposed with optimal stabilization rules, we find that significant stabilization is possible but expensive and that bandwidth rules are likely to prove inadequate because they cannot anticipate.

International Commodity Policy in the UN System: two decades of experience

SUMMARY The slow progress in the implementation of UNCTAD's Integrated Programme for Commodities (IPC) since its establishment in 1976 has given rise to doubts about the merits of international commodity policy, especially as discussed in UNCTAD. The main reason for slow progress is the lack of political will in member countries. There are also some missing links in commodity policy to be pursued by the international community. RESUMEN Politica internacional sobre productos básicos en el sistema de la ONU: dos décadas de experiencia La lentitud con que se ha realizado el Programa Integrado para Productos Básicos (PIPB) de la UNCTAD desde su creación en 1976 ha dado lugar a dudas sobre los méritos de una política internacional sobre productos básicos, tal y como ha sido definida en la UNCTAD. La razón principal de esta lentitud es la falta de voluntad política de los países participantes. Y la comunidad internacional se halla demasiado desconectada para Ilegar a una política común sobre productos básicos. RESUMES La politique internationale des produits de base dans le système des Nations Unies: deux décades d'expérience Le lent progrès dans la mise en oeuvre du Programme Integré pour les Produits de Base de CNUCED depuis son établissement en 1976 a soulevé certains doutes sur les avantages de la politique internationale des produits de base, surtout telle que mise au point par CNUCED. La raison principale pour le lent progrès est le manque de volonté politique dans les pays membres. Il y a aussi quelques points manquants dans la politique des produits de base à être développée par la communauté internationale.

UNCTAD's integrated programme for commodities: Economic implications and Europe's response

This paper discusses some major economic problems raised by proposals towards a new international commodity policy. The author analyses the economic implications of commodity price stabilization and price raising, and focuses on the questions of operationality of the IPC and on the alleged merits of a common financing of individual buffer stocks. He discusses financing schemes compensating for fluctuations of export earnings, and finally points to a number of areas in which Europe could make a constructive contribution to mitigate the commodity problem.

International commodity policy: UNCTAD and NIEO in search of a rationale

This paper concentrates on a critique of international commodity policy from a non-neoclassical perspective. It is argued that, despite the formulation of international commodity policy in UNCTAD and NIEO in terms of broad perspectives for major structural and institutional change, both the theoretical weakness of the formulation of the proposals and the realities of relatively weak bargaining power of Third World countries have led to negotiation almost exclusively in terms of narrowly defined price objectives. The discussion of the theoretical weaknesses is illustrated with reference to simulation studies of commodity markets and empirical evidence on terms of trade movements. It is argued that the UNCTAD/NIEO policies proposed are unsuitable for and unlikely to achieve the desired ends. The final section of the paper examines briefly and finds in the literature on ‘unequal exchange’ a possible hidden rationale for the indexation aspects of UNCTAD/NIEO policy. The paper concludes that the discussion of international commodity policy to date remains outside the realm of serious appraisal of the operation of the world capitalist system and the possibilities therein for major structural and/or institutional change.

Global Bargaining: UNCTAD and the Quest for a New International Economic Order

Negotiations on an international commodity policy have been the central issue on the North-South agenda for the past three years. They also can be seen as the first major effort to give substantive meaning to the Third World's desire not only for a new regime for the world's raw commodity trade but also for a New International Economic Order. Yet various obstacles have impeded successful North-South bargaining, and the negotiations remain at a stalemate. Focusing on the bargaining process between developed and developing countries in the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, Robert Rothstein analyzes the factors that have inhibited successful negotiation and suggests ways in which these obstacles might be removed. The first part of the book focuses on the specifics of the commodity debate, while in the second part the author attempts to explain the causes of delay, misunderstanding, and mistrust within the negotiating process. Assessing the possibility of devising an effective bargaining policy among unequal parties with conflicting values and interests, Professor Rothstein suggests a number of structural, institutional, and conceptual reforms. Originally published in 1979. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Third Boyd Orr Memorial Lecture: The quest for an international commodity policy.

An abstract is not available for this content so a preview has been provided. As you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Commodity Futures Exchanges and the North‐South Dialogue

During the last decade increased attention has been given to the role commodity futures exchanges might play in international commodity policy. There have been suggestions (McKinnon, Houthakker) that national and international agencies, whose goal is the stabilization of commodity prices, should find it less costly to intervene in futures rather than spot markets. Recently, several less developed countries (LDC's) have requested assistance from the industrialized nations in increasing access to commodity exchanges located in developed areas (Conference on International Economic Cooperation). Many developing countries have also asked for help in establishing futures markets in their own countries (U.N. Committee on Trade and Development 1977). The purpose of this paper is threefold: (a) to report on LDC's participation in U.S. markets and discuss related public policy issues, (b) to explore the positive externalities that might be generated in LDC's that establish their own futures markets, and (c) to identify certain issues related to the role of futures markets in international commodity agreements. Although this latter topic is only peripherally related to the first two subjects, it is important because, at the same time we are seeing a growing interest by LDC's in using futures markets, we are also faced with proposals for international commodity agreements that combine governmental activity in futures and cash markets. Developing Countries and Commodity Markets

International commodity policy: The integrated programme for commodities and the common fund

The author reviews the issues and problems which have arisen since May 1976, following the fourth meeting of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). He concludes that prospects for agreement between the developing countries in the Group of 77 and the industrialized West are slight unless there is substantial modification of position by either side.