Notwithstanding the tariffication component of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, import tariffs on farm products continue to provide an incomplete indication of the extent to which agricultural producer and consumer incentives are distorted in national markets. As well, in developing...

For decades the world’s agricultural markets have been highly distorted by national government policies, but very differently for different commodities. Hence a weighted average across countries of nominal rates of assistance or consumer tax equivalents for a product can be misleading as an...

Despite recent reforms, world agricultural markets remain highly distorted by government policies. Traditional indicators of those price distortions can be poor guides to the policies’ economic effects. Recent theoretical literature provides indicators of trade- and welfare-reducing effects of...

Agricultural markets in OECD countries have long been highly distorted by government policies. Traditional weighted average aggregates of the price distortions involved, such as producer and consumer support estimates (PSEs and CSEs), can be poor indicators of the trade restrictiveness and...

Trade negotiators and policy advisors are keen to know the relative contribution of different farm policy instruments to international trade and economic welfare. Nominal rates of assistance or producer support estimates are incomplete indicators, especially when (especially in developing...

For decades, agricultural price and trade policies in Sub-Saharan Africa hampered farmers’ contributions to economic growth and poverty reduction. While there has been much policy reform over the past two decades, the injections of agricultural development funding, together with on-going...

The recent upward spike in the international price of food led some countries to raise export barriers. As in previous price spike periods, that response by some food-exporting countries was accompanied by a lowering of import restrictions by numerous food-importing countries. Both actions...

National barriers to trade are often varied to insulate domestic markets from international price variability. This paper explores the extent of that behavior by governments using estimates of agricultural price distortions in 75 countries. Newly estimated price transmission elasticities are...

We estimate the impact of global merchandise trade distortions and services regulations on agricultural value added in various countries. Using the latest versions of the GTAP database and the GTAP-AGR model of the global economy, our results suggest real net farm incomes would rise in...

Four West African nations have demanded the WTO’s Doha Development Agenda include a Cotton Initiative that involves two issues: cutting cotton subsidies and tariffs, and assisting farm productivity growth in Africa. This paper provides estimates of the potential economic impacts of (a)...