The limitations of the international debate on the liberalization of agriculture:Omissions to the discussion and those missing from the historical account

摘要

4 0% of the world population is concerned with the questions related to the liberalization of agriculture.In spite of this outstanding imponance,the current intense international debate on liberalization is biased by five major problems:the overestimaiion of price effects;the underestimation of structure effects;the minimization of confrontation effects between different types of agriculture;the carelessness about questions related to economic transition and finally;the lack of historical perspective.These biases prevent to pay attention to the existing risks of transition dead-ends for many developing countries,particularly the least developed countries and many of the low income countries where agriculture is still a strategic economic sector.The concrete answers that will be given to this transition challenge will impact the future of the world's geopolitics.