Impact of agro-import surges in developing countries

This report summarises the findings of a series of case studies conducted on import surges. This problem emerged after the implementation of Uruguay Round (UR) liberalisation commitments. Bearing in mind the previous studies, the report sets out the following features:<br /> demonstrating the disruptive impact of the prevailing import surge, particularly on poor farmers highlighting the causes of import surges examining how developing country (DC) governments have responded to the import surge developing recommendations to minimise the damaging impact of import surges<br />The report outlines the extent of import surges, showing that it was recorded in 102 DCs between 1980 and 2003. Then it provides a brief synopsis of the import surge cases. After that, domestic and external factors which trigger food import surges are outlined. The economic and human costs of import surges are also provided through several detailed cases. The report reviews examples of the instruments that governments used to respond to import surges, both legal and illegal under the WTO. Afterward, recommendations for the Doha Round, particularly pertaining to the Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) proposed by G33 are demonstrated.<br /><br />The report claims that there are many reasons why the logic of liberalisation has not worked for subsistence farmers:<br /> putting the developed and developing countries' farmers on a level playing field, expecting that competition will create efficiency is unrealistic the majority of population in DCs are food producers. Low prices of imported food translated into low prices for domestically produced food would reduce the purchasing power of people as documented in the report, the result of food import surges has been rural unemployment, increased rural poverty and rural-urban migration small farmers have found the international markets difficult to access due to the very stringent standards another challenge is lacking financial means to withstand big price fluctuations<br />Finally, the report concludes the following policy recommendations:<br /> a complete ban during certain seasons should be introduced SSM must be available to all the agricultural products state trading enterprises are extremely important for developing countries in terms of managing export and imports and other related aspects both volume and price triggers are necessary for DCs the number of volume triggers and the escalating series of remedies do not need to be complicated to implement