http://www.tradeobservatory.org/headlines.cfm?refID=102421 Under the guidance of institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, IMF, Traeger, who spoke exclusively to THISDAY at the on going UNCTAD XII conference in Accra, Ghana said, most countries in sub-Saharan Africa embraced hook, line and sinker the Structural Adjustment Programme that was prescribed by the Bretton Wood institutions as the panacea for their economic woes.
This he said affected the production systems of these countries, the consequences of which is the current food crisis many of them are now experiencing."The production system of many developing countries underwent serious changes because on one side domestic support for production, that is subsidies to farmers, were generally cut.
At the same time there was a very deep trade liberalization that was put in place by the developing countries as part of the SAP."This means that it was much cheaper and easier to import those products.
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"It means that by importing food at low prices there was much more competition for domestic producers. So on the one side domestic producers lost subsidies and on the other side, they face competition from imported food as a result, they changed what they were cultivating or change the type of activities that they were undertaking.
This also means that the food security of these countries was jeopardised because the domestic capacity to produce food was significantly reduced. (more)
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There are critics of the WB and IMF who contend their programs of trade liberalization are more in the interest of the developed world at the expense of the developing world nations.
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