Analysis of price intervention; The output effects of price intervention; Resource transfers and budget effects; Income distribution effects; Some reflections on the political economy of price intervention.

This new series of comparative studies from the World Bank examines how policies have affected agriculture in eighteen developing countries. It considers the impact of both direct policies toward agriculture and of general development policies on incentives confronting agricultural producers and on agriculture's contribution to development. It is shown that general policies can have effects even more powerful than direct policies on incentives. Price discrimination is estimated against agriculture in individual countries, how it has changed over time, and the political-economic factors that guided the evolution. The authors evaluate the effects of this price discrimination on such key macroeconomic variables as foreign exchange earnings, agricultural output, and income distribution. A full range of country experience is drawn upon to give insight into the motivations of policymakers, the economic and political factors determining agricultural interventions, and the attempts to reform unsuccessful policies.

This study examines the pattern of government intervention in the agricultural markets of the six largest economies in Latin America during 1982-87. Producer and consumer subsidy equivalents (PSE/CSE's) are used to summarize the effects of a wide range of commodity, sector, and economy-wide policies that can be compared across commodities, across countries, and across time. Six chapters provide background material on the economy and policies of each country along with documented subsidy equivalent estimates. During 1982-87, Latin American policymakers abandoned the statist approach to development, but adhered to import-substitution strategies, which required some government intervention. In addition to commodity specific and/or sectoral policies, economy-wide measures -- particularly exchange rate policies -- had a decided effect on transfers to and from the agricultural sector in all six countries.

This book makes an original contribution to the discussion about agro-food exporting countries’ governmental policy. It presents a historicized and internationally contextualized exploration of the political economy of agrarian change in three Latin American countries: Argentina, Praguay, and Uruguay. By comparatively examining how these states have acted in a context of global driven market forces and historically formed institutions, the monograph illuminates the differing capacities of state autonomy under the present era of globalized agriculture.