I have one tiny quibble with this leader in the Guardian.
…while developing countries often need protection in the early stages of development (as the US, Europe and Japan all did).
Who gets the protection and for how long does rather depend upon the quality of those doing the governing, not something we tend to believe is all that high in the poor countries of the world. But that minor quibble aside, the rest of the piece is magnificent, a stirring call for free trade which makes all the right points.
Developing countries now
have their own powerful lobby and are rightly digging their heels in,
insisting on big cuts in agriculture subsidies before they talk about
reducing their own industrial tariffs and subsidies as the west
demands. These two things should not really be linked.
Exactly.
The reduction of farm protection is a good thing for the west to do anyway in its own self-interest,
Undoubtedly true.
The issue is simple: it
is immoral, and economic madness, to give (as the US does) huge
subsidies to farmers to grow cotton, a labour intensive activity that
could generate millions of jobs in Africa; also to grow sugar beet in
Europe rather than in more favourable climates; and for Europe to
subsidise cows by over $2 a day – a larger sum than half the world’s
human population lives on.
Indeed both immoral and economic madness.
Just in case you think I’ve taken a turn for the worst in praising quite so highly something in The Groan perhaps I should point out that Cobden, that great proselytiser for free trade was involved in the founding of the paper? That Vic Keegan, (I think he’s the online editor) runs the Kick-AAS blog? Institutionally, whatever the idiocies of some of the commentators and dittoheads, the paper has traditionally been a great supporter of free trade. As it should be, of course, it’s the only rational thing to do.
Leave a Reply