International Agricultural Policy: A Role for National Food Programmes?

International Agricultural Policy brings to mind that diffuse area of international relations where nations collectively confront the problems of world food and agriculture. To some it is the interplay of national policy actions as they impinge on each other through the trading system and to others it is defined by an endless stream of meetings in the international bureaucracy. In this paper, I want to use a specific and somewhat narrow definition of the area: international agricultural policy will be taken as the set of decisions taken collectively by the international community in pursuit of widely held objectives. The articulation of such objectives need not delay us greatly. As with national policy, too close a definition merely raises issues which hinder the development of programmes: some things are best left implicit. For present purposes, it is enough to assume that they include (i) the development of agricultural potential in the world consistent with general development aims and with the provision and distribution of adequate supplies of food, (ii) the enhancement of stability in the world’s food system to encourage sensible long-run decisions and to avoid disruptions arising from the inevitable fluctuations in food availability, and (iii) the equitable distribution of burdens of adjustment and the transfer of necessary funds internationally to support national efforts.