http://www.indianexpress.com/story/24817._.html
Stiglitz is the flip side of Jagdish Bhagwati on globalisation; I still think Bhagwati wins but this guy is quite awesome too.
Notice the part about US subsidies for farmers - he has only given the example of Cotton but this is true for other agricultural produce too. Refer to these few pages on how the Yankees and Atlanticists depress agriculture prices globally (EU is worse - Euro 43 Billion subsidies).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Agricultural_Policy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_subsidy
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4407792.stm
Also notice how the number of people employed in US farms has shrunk while the subsidy has bloated. All of that money is going into the hands of really big business and not the "family farmer" that the US government would have you believe
A big reason why these "free-traders" will not open up agriculture is that they KNOW (yes KNOW and not suspect) they cannot compete with India. We have
1- the most arable land,
2- the most sunshine,
3- the most crop cycles per year - and
4- most importantly - the MOST educated farmer in the world, with a knowledge endowment stretching over 5000 years.
1 comment:
agriculture, the secret weapon!
the huge, in fact obscene, subsidies given by the US and all the rich countries to their farmers has one and only one rationale: food security.
the cotton farmers in the US have latched on to this sort of thing, getting some $50 billion in subsidies, which ends up destroying the livelihoods and thus the lives of unsubsidized cotton farmers in india, egypt etc. why do people in vidarbha kill themselves? because the yanks subsidize cotton.
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