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These articles have appeared in newspapers worldwide, including:
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Trade & Development Posts
Food crisis12 May 2008
Prices of staple foods have risen by more than 50 per cent over the last six months, causing riots from Cameroon to Burkina Faso, Haiti and Egypt and threatening to push 100 million people into poverty. Developing countries complain about the farm subsidies (some 29% of farmers’ income in the OECD) in developed countries and rich countries complain about the trade barriers put up by developing countries against manufactured goods: but the biggest barriers of all are between developing countries, particularly in Africa, protecting inefficiency, high prices and corruption. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon recently condemned protectionism: “International grain markets must remain open and functioning normally… beggar thy neighbour food wars cannot, in the long-run, help anyone.” The share of developing countries in world trade grew from 29 per cent to 37 per cent between 1996 and 2006, while trade itself was doubling – a massive increase that could be improved by more trade, held up by the stalled Doha Round at the World Trade Organisation. While humanitarian aid saves lives in disasters, development aid simply strengthens trade-distorting policies and corruption in both developing and developed nations. READ the full article at http://www.freemarketfoundation.com/.
Food protectionism, prices and Doha
19 Feb 2008
This Wall Street Journal news analysis argues that current high global food prices could prompt countries to cut import tariffs on agricultural products, thus making an agreement in the Doha trade talks easier – although there is no prospect of a cut in EU or US farm subsidies. The EU has temporarily removed all tariffs on cereal imports, while countries as diverse as Russia, India, and South Korea have cut tariffs on various agricultural imports...
Wealth equals health
18 Feb 2008
A new report from British pressure group Save the Children claims that economic growth does not necessarily translate into a healthier population. The report cites examples such as India, which still suffers high rates of child mortality despite having undergone a prolonged period of economic growth. This report saysnothing new. Reading between the lines, it is a fairly standard call for governments to redistribute wealth and intervene more heavily in the economy, in order to iron out the inequalities which they perceive to perpetuate ill health. However, economic growth certainly does improve health of the individuals who are able to benefit from it, not least because it enables people to afford better sanitation and living conditions, which are the key to reducing most of the disease burden in less developed countries. The point is that not everyone is able to share in economic growth, largely because of counterproductive governance. For example, if the poor do not have property rights, it makes it impossible for them to borrow capital to invest in their own businesses and education and climb up the economic ladder. Meanwhile, the poorest countries erect massive, costly regulatory obstacles to entrepreneurship, meaning that only the politically well-connected and rich can start businesses and create wealth. And so on. Save the Children are right to point out that the poor are still suffering unacceptably poor health as a result of poverty. Their diagnosis is way off the mark, because the redistributory measures they advocate would stifle economic growth and cut off the one mechanism that is vital for improving health. It would be more constructive for Save the Children to talk about empowering the poor instead of clobbering the rich.
The limits of leapfrogging (The Economist)
8 Feb 2008
A recent World Bank report on technology and development (The Economist, 7 Feb. 08, subscribers only) confirms what we've been saying for a while: without the right institutions to facilitate trade and development, such as legally-recognisable property rights and the rule of law, the gains from new technology in under-developed countries will be limited. It's true that mobile phones can stimulate more economic activity and help people help themselves. But few other technologies, if any, are capable of replicating what mobile telephony has already achieved in countries where markets are rigged by powerful politicians and basic infrastructure remains inadequate for all but the ruling clique.
Bill Gates throwing good money after bad
7 Feb 2008
During the annual World Economy Forum in Davos, Bill Gates announced that The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation had set up a US$300 million fund to improve agriculture in the developing world, particularly Africa. For someone who built his fortune in free markets, it is odd that Bill Gates should believe that large amounts of money alone can fight hunger and poverty in the long-term. William Easterly, author of "The White Man's Burden" and critic of foreign aid, says “a New-Age blend of market incentives and feel-good recognition will not end poverty...
Trade & Development
Health tourism can be healthy
By Lucy Davis, Fredrik Erixon27 Jun 2008
Healthcare costs are rising everywhere: in the developed world things can only get worse with ageing populations, while in poor countries there is minimal progress plus a debilitating brain drain. But health tourism could change all that: health tourism is simply free trade in services – a World Trade Organisation clause that has been ratified by very few countries, although Thailand, Singapore, South Africa and India are already demonstrating how to make big bucks in this specialist trade.
Neo-Colonialist NGOs
By Temba A. Nolutshungu7 May 2008
Mugabe overstretches voters’ patience
By Rejoice Ngwenya16 Apr 2008
On the 28th anniversary of throwing off colonial rule, we still cannot throw off one-man rule as President Robert Mugabe clings to power after two million Zimbabweans told him it was time to go.
View the Full Article »Africa: too much leadership
By James Shikwati31 Mar 2008
Kibaki and Odinga are being hailed as great leaders for the political settlement in Kenya and there is even talk of something similar in Zimbabwe - but leadership is part of the problem: Africa suffers from strong leaders and weak institutions.
View the Full Article »Rising food prices, protectionism and the poor
By Caroline Boin, Alec van Gelder20 Mar 2008
Food prices have drastically risen over the past year, causing street protests from Mexico to India to Senegal; it is the poorest countries that will benefit most from dropping their own tariffs in response to this.
View the Full Article »Cuba Libre?
By Andrés Mejía-Vergnaud29 Feb 2008
The only important question about Fidel Castro's resignation is whether it means any real change to the life of ordinary Cubans after decades of economic and political oppression. Economic freedoms and private property are the keys to any economic development and the debate must start now.
View the Full Article »Subsidies for the rich in poor countries
By Roger Bate6 Feb 2008
Champions of local production see it as a way of decreasing transport costs, providing local jobs, increasing expertise, cutting dependence on foreign suppliers--thus lowering prices and magically improving access to drugs. But subsidies, protectionism and political criteria open the door to all sorts of bad policies and all sorts of bad medicines.
View the Full Article »Kenya's elections - practical lessons from Zimbabwe
By David Coltart16 Jan 2008
An Open Letter to the People of Kenya: Isolate Extremists, Protest Peacefully, and Save Our Country
By James Shikwati4 Jan 2008
World trade begins at home
By Alec van Gelder17 Dec 2007
The rhetoric about who is to blame for failing to conclude trade agreements between Europe and Africa obscures a far more important point: Africa is never going to get rich while its governments restrict trade between its own countries, EU deals or not.
View the Full Article »