Agricultural Trade Liberalization in a New Trade Round : Perspectives of Developing Countries and Transition Economies

Ingco, Merlinda ; Winters, L. Alan

Washington, DC:World Bank

关键词: ACCESSION;    AGRICULTURAL COMMODITIES;    AGRICULTURAL EXPORTERS;    AGRICULTURAL EXPORTS;    AGRICULTURAL MARKETS;   

DOI  :  10.1596/0-8213-4986-4
RP-ID  :  WDP418

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This discussion paper contains sevenstudies, designed to a) review, and assess the impact of theimplementation of the Uruguay Round (UR) Agreement onAgriculture, and, b) to analyze the key issues, interests,and options for developing countries in the new World TradeOrganization's (WTO) round of multilateral tradenegotiations in agriculture. Six regional case studies arepresented: Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, Latin America,Eastern Asia, Central and Eastern Europe, and industrialcountries. A quantitative analysis of the dynamics ofmultilateral liberalization in food, and agricultural tradeis also presented. Among some of the key conclusions, it issuggested that much preparatory work was achieved inbringing agriculture fully into the multilateral tradingsystem during the UR, and, a significant achievement was thedevelopment of a broad framework for reductions intrade-distorting policies. The UR was also successful innegotiating reduced volumes of subsidized exports, and inproviding at least, minimum levels of access to markets.There were, however, a number of limitations in both whatwas agreed to, and in how the Agreement in Agriculture hasactually been implemented, as the analyses show that thework achieved during the UR, will be of limited value,unless market distortions in agriculture can be reducedsubstantially. If liberal agricultural trade is to succeed,its limitations should be addressed, and policy induceddistortions to agricultural production, be substantially reduced.