Retailers' private standards are increasingly important in addressing consumer concerns about safety, quality and social and environmental issues. Empirical evidence shows that these private standards are frequently more stringent than their public counterparts. This article develops a political...

The rapid transformation of agri-food value chains in Africa and other developing countries hasimportant implications for economic growth and poverty reduction. Policy makers increasinglyrecognize this but there is a need for a better understanding of what value chain transformationentails and...

This paper studies the political economy of relief aid allocation using empirical evidence from relief programs after a major cyclone (Gafilo) hit Madagascar in March 2004. Relief was provided by the Government of Madagascar as well as local and international aid agencies. Aid allocation was...

The 2003 refirm of the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) under Commissioner Fischler was the most radical in the history of the CAP. This paper analyzes the causes and constraints of the refirm. The paper argues that an unusual combination of pro-refirm factors came together in...

There is no consensus about how globalization -trade and foreign investments ?affects poverty reduction. Using household survey data, this study contributes to the empirical literature on globalization and poverty by analyzing the household-level implications of increased foreign investments and...

Only a few years ago the widely shared view was that low food prices were a curse to developing countries and the poor. The dramatic increase of food prices in 2006-2008 appears to have fundamentally altered this view. The vast majority of analyses and reports in 2008 and 2009 state that high...