Prices Of Primary Products Research Articles

New technology introduction in a marginal coffee area of Colombia

Income stagnation in the downward cycle of primary product prices is a problem for small farmers in developing countries. The recent abrupt price decline in coffee poses a large adjustment problem in marginal production areas. One method of farm income stabilization for marginal export crop production areas is diversification into food crops with improved technology. The potential for a cushioning of this farm income decline via the introduction of improved food crop technology was examined. A substantial moderating effect was obtained even without uprooting the improved coffee technology. Moreover, an analysis of the constraints to the earlier introduction of the Caturra coffee variety helped identify some of the components of farmer decision making relevant to adoption of new technology.

Dependency: a Special Theory Within Marxian Analysis

A dependency which purports to explain underdevelopment in Latin America exclusively as a consequence of the transfer of surplus from backward areas to the metropolis (the exploitation of one nation by another) fails to comprehend the central role of the labor process in the formation of classes as well as class struggle as the motor of history. Divorced from the material reality of the working classes, it ignores the role of the masses in making history. It is static. Despite occasional calls for socialist revolution, it is based in idealism and is therefore incapable of guiding revolutionary action. Moreover, such a dependency presents the poverty, hunger, and oppression of peasants and workers as a consequence of a capitalism deformed by foreign monopoly capital. It imagines that an anti-imperialist coalition led by local capital could bring about normal capitalist development. Thus, this dependency defends the interest of local capital against Marxism-Leninism and against the struggle of the working classes for socialist revolution. This dependency is implicit in the work of Raul Prebisch and the Economic Commission for Latin America, which identified the long-term tendency in the terms of trade to be a decline in the relation of prices of primary products to prices of manufacturers. (Ironically, though this theory did truly speak on behalf of local capital, it set the stage for the penetration of foreign monopoly capital into the industrial sector under the recipe of importsubstitution.) This formulation was replaced in the mid-1960s by more adequate, radical, and Marxist efforts. However, the bourgeois nationalist concept of dependency reappeared in the 1970s beginning with Raul Fernandez and Jose Ocampo's article in the first issue of Latin American Perspectives. They and other left sectarians have equated the work of radical and Marxist writers such as Andre Gunder Frank, Theot6nio dos Santos, and Ruy Mauro Marini with the limited bourgeois nationalist concept of dependency. In this fashion, the left sectarian critics ignore the explicit object of their attacks, the radical and Marxist dependentistas, and use bourgeois dependency as a straw man.

The ‘Real’ Price of Primary Products

This article traces the course of world commodity prices back to the middle of the 19th century and attempts to assess the changes in their purchasing value by deflating them by the export prices of manufactured goods. The purchasing power of commodity prices was in decline over long periods but they usually regained their earlier real value, or improved on it, in powerful upsurges of which the 1972-74 boom was the most recent; it was also unique in peacetime and, though with fluctuations, the purchasing value of commodities has since remained at a relatively high level.

Why inflation is not relative price-neutral for primary products

Studies of inflation tend to neglect relative prices although it has long been known (and recently confirmed) that relative price changes are more pronounced in periods of severe inflation. This paper advances the hypothesis that for the developing countries' primary products the distinction between demand and cost inflation is important: the former will improve the relative price of primary products; the latter will cause them to deteriorate if the cost inflation originates in developed countries. In the long run these effects may be cancelled out but not before they have lasted long enough to merit our attention.

Price Determination in the Multi-Country Model

The goal of this paper is to obtain consistent specifications for domestic, export, and import price equations for use in the multicountry model project being undertaken by Quantitative Studies Section. The multi-country model, described in [3], consists of small-scale macroeconomic sub-models for the United States, Canada, Japan, Germany, and the United Kingdon linked together to capture international economic and financial interactions. The domestic and export price equations are derived from the structure of the prototype country sub-model. The import price equation is developed as a weighted average of the appropriate exporting countries' export prices and exogenours price of primary products.

Underdeveloped Countries and Manufactured Exports

Although exports of underdeveloped countries (UDCs) are currently for the most part primary products, with manufactured exports accounting for only about 15 per cent of the total, the future growth of these exports is crucial to the success of efforts to achieve economic development in these countries. This proposition holds regardless of whether one accepts the widely held view that the outlook for primary product exports is extremely bleak. That view may turn out to be too pessimistic. The proposition that there is a secular tendency for the prices of primary products to decline relatively to those of manufactured products is not well supported by either the empirical evidence (unless that evidence is presented rather selectively) or by theoretical argument. The claim that prices have a long-run tendency to move against primary products and in favour of manufactured products is often the premise to an argument that the UDCs will have to move out of specialization in primary products towards the production and export of manufactured products. But the conclusion does not depend upon this premise. Production of primary products will not be a sufficient basis for economic development even if the trends in primary product prices turn out to be extraordinarily favourable. A few countries in specially favourable circumstances may be able to raise income per head to high levels by achieving high levels of productivity in the production of primary products and obtaining their requirements of manufactured products through international trade.

Supply and demand for forest products—an econometric study

Forest products dealt with were “all” lumber, softwood lumber, paper, paperboard, building paper and board and softwood plywood (referred to collectively as wood products), and softwood sawlogs, pulpwood, peeler logs and softwood sawlog stumpage (referred to collectively as primary products). The foundation of the study was a system of interrelated linear demand and supply relationships. Although only mill-level relationships were specified, attention was given to higher levels of demand and supply in their formulation. The study was limited to producers and consumers in the United States except for a brief consideration of Canadian suppliers of lumber and newsprint. Coefficients of wood product supply and demand relationships were estimated by 2-stage least squares, using annual data for the years 1929 to 1960. Point estimates of elasticities for wood products were prepared for the year 1960 to show the influence of “own” price, prices of competing materials, prices of inputs in production, and other supply and demand shifters. Lack of data on quantities marketed made it impossible to carry out estimation for primary products. Forecasts of wood product prices and consumption levels, and primary product prices, were made for a prediction period ending in 1975. Three types of forecasting equations were used: “solved structural,” “complete reduced form” and “exogenous reduced form.” Forecasting methods were compared, using 1961 and 1962 data which had been excluded from the sample period. Basic predictions were adjusted using actual and predicted values for 1961 and 1962. On empirical and theoretical grounds the adjusted solved structural method was judged to be generally the most satisfactory one. Forecasts of consumption levels of certain wood products prepared in this way were compared with predictions made in studies carried out by the U. S. Forest Service, U. S. Department of Commerce, the Stanford Research Institute, and Resources for the Future, Inc.

The Demand for Industrial Materials, 1950-57

Only eight or nine years ago, at the time of the Korean war, it was widely believed that there would be a continuing world-wide shortage of many primary products; that there was a long-term tendency for the prices of primary products to rise faster than the prices of manufactured goods; and that, as a consequence, the terms of trade were bound to go on turning in favour of primary producing countries and against manufacturing nations such as Britain.

The De-Stabilising Effect of International Commodity Agreements on the Prices of Primary Products

Journal Article The De-Stabilising Effect of International Commodity Agreements on the Prices of Primary Products Get access Harry G. Johnson Harry G. Johnson King's College, Cambridge Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The Economic Journal, Volume 60, Issue 239, 1 September 1950, Pages 626–629, https://doi.org/10.2307/2226825 Published: 01 September 1950

New Zealand-A National Survey

THE political activities of Cabinet and Parliament so far in 1931 may be summed up as Balancing Budget and Tempering Wind to Shorn Lamb. The situation that confronted Mr. Forbes, Prime Minister, on his return on January 20 from Imperial Conference was described by him as the greatest crisis in New Zealand's history. The sudden and unprecedented fall in prices for our national products has caused a deficit for year ending March 31, 1931, which is now estimated at ?1,250,000, and deficit for coming year is now (April 20) estimated at ?5,500,000. Unemployment, despite strenuous efforts of Government, Unemployment Board and local authorities, continued to increase. Many farmers in consequence of fall in prices of primary products had lost part or whole of their equity in their farms. The national railways showed a heavy loss.