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Shifting and sharing adjustment burdens: the role of the industrial food importing nations

Too often world food problems are viewed as North-South problems, as matters to be resolved between rich and poor. In fact, most world food trade takes place entirely among the rich. The industrial nations of the European Community, Japan, and the USSR import more food today than all of the poor countries combined. These industrial food importing nations make a dubious contribution to the stability and security of the world food system. In different measure, they seek to shift adjustment burdens onto others, to enjoy something of a free ride. All have subsidized production for export in times of world surplus, and all have stepped ahead of poor countries to purchase high priced imports in times of scarcity. To these burden-shifting trade policies, the USSR in particular adds its own troublesome nonparticipation in most multilateral efforts at world food policy management. Prospects for improved burden sharing in the future are dim. Fortunately, the world food system still gains most of its stability and security from separate production decisions within nations, rather than from collective storage, trade, or aid decisions among nations.