Making U.S. Trade Policy Serve Global Food Security Goals
| Author | Karen Hansen-Kuhn |
| Position | International Program Director, Trade and Global Governance, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy ('IATP') |
| Pages | 9-13 |
9SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT LAW & POLICY
INTRODUCTION
To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work
alongside you to make your farms flourish and
let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bod-
ies and feed hungr y minds. And to those nati ons like
ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer
afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor
can we consume the world’s resources without regard to
effect. For the world has changed, and we must change
with it.
—President Barack Obama1
More than any U.S. president in his tory, Barack Obama
has focu sed public attentio n on global hunger and the need to
bolster food produ ction by small-scale fa rmers in developing
countries. He championed this cause at the 2009 G-8 meeting
in L’Aquila, Italy, where he called on world leaders to commit
$20 billion to address food security, promising $3.5 billion from
the Unite d States.2 After a series of consultations among vari-
ous government ag encies and civil society organiz ations, the
Obama Administration launched the Feed the Future initiative in
April 2010.3 This program emphasizes the importance of small-
scale far mers, especially women, in country-led programs and
a multiagency “whole of government” approach to global food
security.4
Conversely, trade talk s are gaining new momentum. After
a two-year lull following the collapse of the World Trade Orga-
nization (“WTO”) talks in 2008, G- 20 leaders have ca lled for
a resu mption of t he negotiations in 2011, with WTO Director
General Pascal Lamy calling for completion of draft modality
texts by the end of March.5 The United States is also promoting
its own ambitious agenda of regional an d bilateral trade talks.
Negotiations for a Trans-Pacific Partnership continue to advance
and to expand to even more countries in Southeast Asia.6 The
U.S. and South Korean governments recently resolved remain-
ing differences over market access for automobiles in the United
States-Korea Free Trade Agreement (“FTA”).7 That agre ement,
along wit h p ending bilatera l a greements with Pa nama and
Colombia, could be introduced for Congressiona l approval in
2011.8
The food, finance, and climate crises are all evidence of how
much the world has changed since the era of free trade accords
began, but the U.S. agricultural trade agenda remains essentially
the sam e as the approach first adopted in the 1990s under the
North American Free Trade Ag reement (“ NAFTA”).9 Recent
reports of rising food prices and riots in so me countries10 add
new urgency to the imperative to get these policies right.
U.S. trade policy mu st start from our goals rather than o ur
tactics. Ending global hunger, enhancing incomes and employ-
ment, and encouraging a transition to climate friendly agriculture
should be the goals of U.S. agricultural, economic, and develop-
ment policy. Trade policy should be a tool to support those goals
rather than a loose cannon that shoots them down.
FROM DUMPING TO VOLATILITY: THE LESSONS
OF TRADE LIBERALIZATION
Much of the internat ional debate on trade and agriculture
over the past deca de has focused on U.S. (and EU) agricultural
subsidies11 but have not addressed the systemic causes of dump-
ing, i.e., exporting at below the cost of production. Floods of
cheap imports, especially during the harvest, ca n be devastat-
ing for developing-count ry fa rmers.12 As of 2003, dumping
margins for U.S. co mmodity crops supported under the Farm
Bill included wheat exports at an average price of twenty-eight
percent below th e cost of production, corn at ten percent, and
rice at twenty-six percent below the cost of production.13 Today,
recurring bouts of rising food prices have decreased the extent of
dumping,14 but deregulated trade continues to present challenges
for stable local food markets.
Over the last few decades, U.S. agricultural polic y has
changed from a system of supply managem ent to one more
dependent on free-market forces. This process culminated in the
1996 Farm Bill, which removed the last vestiges of supply man-
agement and enacted policies to encourage farmers to increase
the volume of production to c ompensate for lower prices, with
a strong focus on creating new markets overseas for U.S. com-
modities.15 That system soon resulted in a series of crises in rural
making u.S. traDe policy Serve global FooD
Security goalS*
by Karen Hansen-Kuhn**
* This i s a revised version of Karen Hansen-Kuhn, Making U.S. Trade Policy
Serve Global Food Security Goals, INST. FOR AGRIC. & TRADE POL’Y (Jan. 2011),
http://www.iatp.org/iatp/publications.cfm?accountID=451&refID=107901.
** International Program Director, Trade and Globa l Governance, Institute
for Agriculture and Trade Policy (“IATP”). Karen Hansen-Kuhn joined IATP
in September 2009. She has been working on trade and economic just ice since
the beginning of the North American Free Trade Agreement (“NAFTA”) debate,
focusing especially on bringing developing countries’ perspectives into public
debates on trade, food security, and economic policy. She has published articles
on U.S. trade and agriculture policies, the i mpacts of U.S. biofuels policies on
food security, and women and food crises. She was the international coordinator
of the Alliance for Responsible Trade (“ART”), a U.S. multi-sectoral coalition
promoting just and sustainable trade until 2005. After that, she was Policy Direc-
tor at t he U.S. office of ActionA id, an international development organization.
She holds a B.S. in international business from the University of Colorado and a
master’s degree in International Development from American University.
10SPRING 2011
areas and the enactment of emergency payments, later codified
as the current system of agricultural subsidies.16
Commodi ty prices skyrocketed du ring 2007 and 2008,
and farmers were better able to cover their costs of production,
reducing counter-cyclical payments from the U.S. g overnment
to far mers, which ris e to compensate farmers when prices are
low for those crops.17 As a result o f this increase in commod-
ity price s, U.S. agricultural subsidies dropped from more than
twenty-four billion dolla rs in 2 005 to just over twelve billion
dollars in 2009.18 In many countries, locally grown fo od sud-
denly became cheaper than imports, but after decades of neglect
of agricultural sectors, production levels were too low to be
able to fully meet domestic de mand.19 Conc erns over dump-
ing have been overtaken by alarm over food-price volatility, as
wild swings in prices make planning more and more difficult for
farmers around the world.
The pre cise causes of the 2008 food p rice crisis a nd
the recent bouts of price swings are still the subject of m uch
debate.20 They include rising demand, extreme weather condi-
tions, and excess ive financial ins titution specu lation on com-
modity markets.21 New limits on commodity speculation in the
United States and EU are imperative to decrease the wild price
swings experienced in recent years.22 However, policymakers in
developing countries also need new ways to manage trade flows,
so they can rebuild fragile agricultural sectors.
Mexico’s experience under NAFTA provides a telling exam-
ple of the dangers of this approach for food security and rural
livelihoods. Th e agreement eliminated t rade barriers for most
sectors, with tariffs on cor n and beans phased out over fourteen
years.23 In fact, the M exican government accelerated the tari ff
reduction schedule, and United States exports of corn to Mexico
nearly quadrupled compared to the pre-NAFTA levels.24 Mexi-
can agricultural exports to the United States also increased at an
average of ten percent a year,25 but the benefits of those sales
did not trickle down to rural communities. Many Mexican farm-
ers were unable to com pete with the cheap imports, and more
than two million have left the agricultural sector since NAFTA
began, a drop of nearly twenty-five percent.26 Since job creation
in other sectors of the economy has been weak, rural poverty has
increased and many people have been forced to migrate to cities
in search of elusive manufacturing sect or jobs or to the United
States in search of better opportunities.27
There is little evidence that the growth in U.S. exports under
NAFTA has h elped family farmers in this country either. The
number of Americans employed in agriculture has dropped since
the agreement began (as has manufactu ring e mployment).28
The relationship between employment a nd trade is complex,
even in the United States, as job creation from export growth
can be offset by job losses resulting from imports that compete
with domestic production. The kind of production also matter s
as large-scale a gro-industrial production for export generally
employs fewer peop le than smaller-scale, locally oriented pro-
duction. As smaller-scale producers have been forced to seek off-
farm income, larger producers and corporations have increased
their share o f production. Over the last twenty-five years, there
has been a marked shift in the size of U.S. farms, with very small
farms (with annual sales less than ten thousand dollars) and very
large farms (sales exceeding one million dollars) increasing
by thirty -eight and 243 percent, respect ively.29 The number of
small, but commercially viable farms (sales between ten and two
hundred and fifty thousand dollars) dropped by forty pe rcent,
from half of total far ms in 1982 to less than a third in 2007.30
The percentage of U.S. agricultural production controlled by the
top four firms in a given sector has increased substantially, rising
from seventy-two percent of beef packing in 1990, for example,
to 83.5 percent in 2005.31
Since NAFTA, U.S. agri cultural produ ction, bot h for
domestic use and exports, has increased while rural employment
and livelihoods have faltered. While a substantial portion of corn
production is n ow directed to domestic ethanol production,32
exports of corn, wheat, and other commodity crops have c on-
tinued to grow.33 According to the United States Department of
Agriculture (“USDA”) estimates, ag ricultural bulk expo rt vol-
umes increased eight percent in 2010 over 2009 levels, while the
bulk export values increased seventeen percent.34
The recent surge in U.S. f arm income is instructive. N et
farm income increa sed twen ty-six percent in 2010 over the
2000–2009 average, triggered, a ccording to some analysts, by
rising exports.35 However, the USDA also notes that,
[a] second feature of the 2000–2009 decade is the high
and persi stent levels of volatility in ag ricultural com-
modity and input (feed, fue l, and fertilizer) markets.
The volatility is reflected in the patterns of farm income
during the decade. Net farm income increased in 6 of
the 10 years, posting an average increase of 26.6 per-
cent in the years wi th increases in farm incom e and
an average decline of 23.5 percent in the other years
(2002, 2005, 2006, and 2009).36
These wild swings in prices and incomes destabilize rural
communities and contribute to increasing corporate concentra-
tion. Whether in the United States or overseas, agricultural poli-
cies that stabilize prices at levels nearer the co st of production
could provide consistent signals and incentives to help farmers
stay on their land and produce stable food supplies.37
These problems are not u nique to the NAFTA par tners.
In countr y after country, t rade liberalization in agriculture ha s
weakened local production and undermined rural livelihoods.38
Women produce sixty to eighty percent of food in many devel-
oping count ries.39 They are par ticularly vulnerable to the risks
created by dumping and volati le markets, since their access to
productive resources is often already prec arious. The emphasis
on ag ricultural exports in the 199 0s tended to result in a shift
away from food production for household consump tion, which
tended to be controlled by women, to cash crops, which tended
to be controlled by men.40 The U.S. Feed the Future ini tiative
recognizes the vital importance of women’s contrib utions to
food secu rity and would direct more resources to women farm-
ers.41 If the point of the U.S. global hunger policy is to improve
food security and rural livelihoods for women and men, th en
11 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT LAW & POLICY
appropriate trade mechanisms also need to be in place to ensure
that they can stay on their land.
Haiti is anoth er stark example of how trade polici es can
undermine food secur ity. As recently as the 1980s, Haiti pro-
duced eighty percent of the rice it needed for domestic consump-
tion.42 Under st ructural adj ustment progr ams imposed by the
World Bank, International M onetary Fund (“IMF”) and United
States A gency for In ternationa l Developmen t (“USAID”) ,
among others, Haiti lifted import controls and reduced public
support to agriculture.43 Today, it imports eighty percent o f its
rice needs and receives substa ntial food aid for recurring food
shortages.44
In March 2010, former President Bill Clinton testified to the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the push to export rice
to Haiti had been a grave mistake, stating:
Since 1981, the United States has followed a policy,
until the last year or so when we started r ethinking it,
that we rich countries that produce a lot of food should
sell it to poor countrie s and relieve them of the bur-
den of producing their own foo d, so, thank goodness,
they can leap directly into the industrial era. It has not
worked. It may have been good for some of my farmers
in Arkansas, but it has not worked. It was a mistake. It
was a mist ake that I was a party to. I am not pointing
the finger at anybody. I did that. I have to live every day
with the consequences of the lost capacity to produce a
rice crop in Haiti to feed those people, because of what
I did. Nobody else.45
Unfortunately, it is not at all clear that the U.S. government
has in fact sta rted to r ethink this policy. The President’s 20 10
Trade Policy Agenda clearly stated the intention to expand U.S.
exports, even to developing countries.46 While Least Developed
Countries (“LDCs”) are not being asked to ag ree to any new
commitments to reduce tariffs under the Doha Round, there is
no indication that United States Trade Representative (“USTR”)
is reconsidering the wisdom o f the previous rounds of tariff
reductions.
A better approach would be to explicitly exempt low-income
food import-dependent countries from U.S. expo rt promotion
goals and to allow flexibility to establish tariff rates ade quate
to prote ct their vulne rable agricultural markets. The LDCs, as
defined by the United Nat ions, include some forty-eight least -
developed c ountries, thirty-on e of which are also members of
the WTO.47 It includes such countries as Haiti, Senegal, and
Bangladesh, many of which experienced food riots during the
2008 price spike.48 The United States does no t have free-trade
trade agreements with any of these countries, so this would be a
relatively simple first step.
A second step would be to more carefully consider poverty
and hunger within middle-income countries. USTR has entered
into a series of discussions with India, Brazil, South Africa, and
China, both to enlist their support to restart the WTO talks, and
to pre ss them to liberalize their own market s.49 Each o f these
countries is unique, but they all face challenges in local food
product ion. A ccording to researc h p repared for the United
Nations Development Programme (“UNDP”) Human Develop-
ment Report, there are mor e poor people in India than in the
twenty-six African countries combined,50 and suicides by farm-
ers who have lost their land are devastating evidence of the fra-
gility of their agricultural system.51
Developing countries in th e G-33 have argue d for WTO
exemptions for Special Products and for the establishment of a
new Special Safeguard Mechanism to protect food security and
livelihoods and to advance rural development.52 Whi le WTO
members (including the U nited States) c ommitted to the prin-
ciple of protecting local markets to advance food security at the
2005 Hong Kong Ministerial, in practice this has been a central
point of contention in the WTO talks.53 The G-33’s insist ence
on these mechanisms (as well as United States intransigence on
subsidies) was one of the key factors in the collapse of the WTO
talks in 2008.54 A better approach would be to work with devel-
oping countries to consider th e best ways t o implement these
mechanis ms and other neces sary measures to advance food
security goals over export promotion.
THE TRADE RULES NEEDED TO RESPOND TO
CLIMATE AND FOOD CRISES
Agric ulture has always been subjec t to unpre dictable
weather patterns, pests, and diseases. These risks are exacer-
bated by climate chang e, which is already causing changes in
growing seasons and increases in droughts and flooding.55 These
effects will become more frequent and more devastating in years
to come,56 making it even more important to support flexible and
innovative new approaches in developing countries. Efforts to
strengthen local agricultural production in ways that respond to
these challenges and benefit local communities and plans to fos-
ter regional cooperation in times of crisis are critical.
Nationa l an d r egional coordinati on o f f ood reserves is
emerging as an important tool to confront volatility in food sup-
plies. The UN Comprehe nsive Framework for Act ion on the
Global Food Crisis (a multiage ncy effort to coordinat e donor
policies) recognizes the impor tance of reserves.57 Reserves and
other m easures to l imit price vola tility and s upply availability
will be at the center of the agenda at the May 2011 G-20 Ag ri-
culture Ministers summit and the fall Committee on World Food
Security meeting.58
Several groupings of countries are already taking action to
implement r egional reserves systems. “In March 2010, Brazil,
Russia, India and China (the BRIC nations) ag reed to support the
establishment of a system of national grain reserves.”59 In Octo-
ber, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (“ASEAN”) plus
Japan, China, and Korea committed to establish a regional emer-
gency rice reserve, building on a pilot program that has been
operating for several years.60 In December, West African nations
meeting in the Club du Sahel explored proposals to coordinate
national food reserves sy stems to assist each other in cases of
crop failures or other crises.61
A s ystem of food reser ves does not replace international
trade, but it can be an import ant means to stabilize national
and regional food supplies. Food reser ves can be supported or
12SPRING 2011
constrained by trade rules that govern public support to agricul-
ture. WTO r ules and U.S. trade policy discourage public man-
agement of food supplies, but there is some degree of flexibility
that would no t prevent countries from starting to i mplement
such programs.62 Food reserves do require public support to buy
and sell stocks. The WTO Agreement on Agriculture limits how
much governments can spend to support agriculture.63 While the
establishment of a grain reserve in the United States could raise
overall support beyond those limits, developing countries would
be unlikely to exceed the limits included under current rules.
Price bands could be a bigg er issue fo r U.S. trade policy.
Most reserves systems operate so that when prices reach pre-
determined floo rs or ceilings the government in tervenes.64 If it
has buffer stocks, it could release those reserves onto the market
to reduce high prices or confront local food shortages. It would
purchase grains when prices are low, particularly during the har-
vest. These price bands are often coordinated with trade policy,
with tariffs on imports trigger ed when prices fal l, and reduced
when they rise. While WTO rules generally limit such measures,
in practice, many developing countries have some degree of flex-
ibility in the application of tariff rates. 65 Since m any of them
have agreed to bound tariff rates (ceilings) that are higher than
the actual applied rates, they could utilize the difference in tariff
rates (“wate r” in WTO lingo) to operate a price band and still
comply with WTO ru les.66 The G-33’s proposals for a Special
Safeguard Mechanism would institutionalize price band s as a
legitimate tool to combat volatility.67 USTR has argued against
these measures at the WTO, pressi ng for r eductions in bound
tariff rates and opposing the G-33’s proposal for a Special Safe-
guard Mechanism.68 In negotiations for a US-Andean Free Trade
Agreement , the United States insisted on the dismantlin g of
the system of price bands established under the Andean Pact.69
Those negotiations were later narrowed to a bilateral agreement
between the United States and Peru, which liberalized all trade
in agricultural goods and eliminated the Peruvian government’s
participation in the regional price band.70
The conflic ts between trade rules and food reserves could
emerge in th e n egotiations for a Trans- Pacific Part nership
(“TPP”). The TPP ta lks cur rently include Au stralia, Brunei,
Chile, Malaysia, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore , the United
States, and Vietnam.71 The Philippines, Canada, and Japan have
also expressed interest in joining the talks.72 Brunei, Malaysia,
Vietnam and the Philippines are also members of ASEAN and
are partic ipating in the E mergency Rice Reserve System, as is
South Korea.73 Those talks should balance interests in expand-
ing trade with the measures needed to support food reserves and
other elements of food security.
INTEGRATING NUTRITION IN TRADE AND
DEVELOPMENT
Improving food security means increasing both the quantity
of food available to local consumers and ensuring that its nutri-
tional quality is adequate. The administration’s Feed the Future
initiative lists two central objectives: accelerating inclusive agri-
culture sector growth, and improving nu tritional status.74 U.S.
trade policy focuses on harmonizing food safety standards (both
to gene rate new market opportunities and to e nsure consumer
safety),75 but it does not consider the nutritio nal value of the
kinds of food systems encouraged by liberalization of trade and
investment.
The debate on nutritional quality is already underway within
the United States, where concerns about rising obesity rates and
food safety have increased demand for organic foods and locally
grown fruits and vegetables.76 There is a growing p ublic rec-
ognition that Farm Bill su pports for cor n, soy, wheat, and rice
have shifted diets towards processed foods and meats rather than
healthier alternatives.77 U.S. trade policy should also reflect this
new thinking in the kinds of food production encouraged by lib-
eralized trade and the innovations needed to improve nutritional
outcomes.
Mexico’s experience under NAFTA provides some i mpor-
tant lessons. Since the agreement ’s inception in 1994, Mexi-
can imports of corn and soy u sed for animal feed, as well as
of pr ocessed snack foods, soda and othe r foods characteristic
of unhea lthy d iets, have skyrocketed. 78 Liberalization of trade
and investment rules has also spur red sharp increases in U.S.
investment all a long the Mexican supply chain, including food
processing, supermarkets and fas t food restaurants.79 O besity
rates in Mexico have risen to rates similar to those in the United
States.80 A mong OE CD count ries, M exico is now tied with
the United States for the highest per capita o besity rates in the
world.81 The phenomenon of increasing malnutri tion occurring
at the same time as over-nutrition is escalating in many countries
around the world as people just above the poverty line consume
increasing amounts of meats, p rocessed foods and other rela-
tively low-cost, high-calorie foods.82
The United States cannot leg islate co nsumer de mand in
other countries, but it could assure that its trade policy does not
preclude governments from implementing changes in local food
systems to improve the quality of food available to consumers. A
government might decide, for example, to procure fresh food for
anti-poverty programs from local farm cooperatives rather than
importing it from a multinational corporation (along the lines of
Brazil’s successful Zero Hunger program).83 Depending on how
the government has listed the implementing agencies in its trade
commitments, these kinds of programs could conflict with pro-
curement rules that aim to prevent discrimination against foreign
suppliers.84
Some types of food security p rograms could also be the
target of investor l awsuits. Like nearly all U. S. trade agree -
ments and bilateral investment treaties, NAFTA allows foreign
investors t o sue governme nts for co mpensation for regula tory
changes or prog rams that undermine their ex pected profits .85
One section of the investment chapter bans certain “performance
requirements” on foreign investors, including the requirement to
achieve a given level o r percentage of domestic content in pro-
duction.86 Thus, for example, if the Mexican government were to
require tortilla manufacturers in Mexico to use a certain percent-
age of locally grown (and more expensive) corn in their produc-
13 SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT LAW & POLICY
tion, U.S. companies that own tortilla operations there could sue
for compensation.
Most trade agreements include recourse to state-to-state dis-
pute resolution.87 The investor-state provision allows companies
to bypass that mechanism, as well as local court systems, to sue
governments directly.88 Most environmental, labor, and other
public-interest groups have argued against this provision in most
bilateral trade agreement the United States has negotiated since
NAFTA.89
These concerns are not just theoretical. The U.S.-based Met-
alclad corporat ion was awarded $15.6 million in compensation
when it sued the Mexican government over a local community’s
refusal to reopen a t oxic waste facil ity. 90 A subs idiary of the
U.S.-based Becht el corporation sued the Bolivian government
when it cancelled the privatization of a water distribution system
in the wake of widespread public protests over excessive user
fees.91 In 2010, Phillip Morris filed an investor-state suit against
the Uruguayan government over rules on health warnings on cig-
arette packages.92 Even when such suits are unsuccessful, they
have a chilling effect on local efforts to balance public interests
with private profits.
Some trade agreements and bilateral investment treaties
include tentative first steps that could start to address that imbal-
ance. The United States-Peru FTA, fo r exampl e, esta blishes
some general exceptions for measures designed to protect pub-
lic health, safety and the environment, but these exceptions do
not apply to the chapter on investment.93 This kind of exception
should be applied more bro adly to specifically exempt public
interest laws from challenges.94
Unfortunately, current U.S. trade policy seems to be headed
in the opposite direction, affirming the Bush era approach. News
reports indicate that the United States is pr essing Aust ralia,
which refused to include the investor-state provision in its FTA
with th e United Stat es, to recons ider that po sition in the talks
for a Trans-Pacific Partnership.95 The recently signed US-Korea
FTA resorts to the old approach as well, with only limited excep-
tions to protect the public good.96
RECOMMENDATIONS
Ultimate ly, the U.S. governmen t shou ld ta ke a compre-
hensive set of acts that will alleviate these problems. It should
review provisions in existing trade agreements that undermine
food security and launch a process to reform them.97 The admin-
istration should explicitly exempt Leas t Developed Countries
from U.S . export-promotio n goals, and work with developing
countries to establish trade rules that support price bands and
other mechanisms to promote stable food supplies. On an inter-
governmental level, it should support proposals at the WTO and
in t he negotiations for a Trans -Pacific Partnership for Spe cial
Products and Special Safeguard Mechani sms to advance food
security and rural livelihoods in developing countries. Lastly, the
United States could establish exceptions to investment and pro-
curement provisions in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and oth er
ongoing bilateral trade negotiations to protect public health and
food security.
CONCLUSION
Rather than conti nuing with the same tired approaches
used in recent decades, it is time for a truly twenty-first century
approach to trade policy, one that starts with a clear commitment
to strengthening food systems and rural livelihoods in the South
and North. It is not enough to consider changes in trade balances
or growth in exports in particular sectors. We must examine how
those changes affect our societies and environments, both in the
North and South.
The 2008 food price cr isis led to a reexamination of agri-
cultural development policies and the conclusion that decades of
neglect of public investment in the sector had been a mistake.98
President Obama took a leadership role in the 2009 G-8 meeting,
committing to scale up food security spending and calling on
other countries to do the same.99 The Feed the Future initiative
and increases in U.S. government spending on food security are
evidence of a commitment to redress that mistake and chart a
new course to decrease global hunger.
Sadly, that effort will likely collide with the administration’s
push to double U.S. exports and negotiate new trade agree ments
along the same lines as the past. Spendi ng to increase produc-
tion by s mallholder farmers wil l be undercut by floods of U.S.
exports. Efforts to establish food reser ves could be undercut by
trade rules that restrict governm ents’ ab ilities to manage sup-
plies.100 Programs to encourage consumption of healthy, locally
grown foods could collide with investor protections that fail to
balance public and private interests.101 Decades of expansion of
agricultural exports have no t helped U.S. far mers either. Farm
incomes have been on a rollercoaster ride that has thrown farm-
ers overboard, increasing corporate concentration.102 There is no
reason to expect that expanding the same failed po licies of the
past will have better outcomes now.
Instead, trade and food security policy should focus on
rebuilding local food systems in the North and South. This does
not mean abandoning trade or closing markets, but considering
ways to en sure that trade complements, rather than substitutes
for, loc al food production. The U.S. government should work
with developing countries to det ermine the best ways to struc-
ture price bands a nd other trade protections to achieve f ood
security and development goals, rather than blocking progress
on these new approaches.
Added to the evidence of the past is the challenge of the
future. Climate change and the end of cheap oil is a dispositive
factor in det ermining food security and trade policy.103 Innova-
tive new approaches that bui ld on local knowledge to red uce
reliance on agro chemicals and imported inputs are not just excit-
ing, they are imperative.104 Trade and development policies must
create the necessary policy s pace for these innovations rather
than insis ting on the extension of twentieth century models of
industrial agriculture and dependence on imports.
Endnotes: Making U.S. Trade Policy Serve Global Food
Security Goals on page 36
