Seeds of Deception: Exposing Industry and Government Lies About the Safety of the Genetically Engineered Foods You're Eating

Seeds of Deception: Exposing Industry and Government Lies About the Safety of the Genetically Engineered Foods You're Eating
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A good reason to eat organic and avoid processed foods

A must read

If you think GM foods are safe, think again.

No one is harder to teach...

What americans don't know...

Seeds of Deception: Exposing Industry and Government Lies About the Safety of the Genetically Engineered Foods You're Eating
Jeffrey M. Smith
Manufacturer: Yes! Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0972966587

Book Description

Without knowing it, Americans eat genetically modified (GM) food everyday. While the food and chemical industries claim that GMO food is safe, a considerable amount of evidence shows otherwise. In Seeds of Deception, Jeffrey Smith, a former executive with the leading independent laboratory testing for GM presence in foods, documents these serious health dangers and explains how corporate influence and government collusion have been used to cover them up. The stories Smith presents read like a mystery novel. Scientists are offered bribes or threatened; evidence is stolen; data withheld or distorted. Government scientists who complain are stripped of responsibilities or fired. The FDA even withheld information from congress after a GM food supplement killed nearly a hundred people and permanently disabled thousands. While Smith was employed by the laboratory he was not allowed to speak on the health dangers or the cover-up. No longer bound by this agreement, Smith now reveals what he knows in this groundbreaking exposé. Today, food companies sell GM foods that have not undergone safety studies. FDA scientists opposed this, but White House and industry pressure prevailed and the agency's final policy--co-authored by a former Monsanto attorney--denied the risks. The scientists' concerns were made public only after a lawsuit forced the agency to turn over internal documents. Dan Glickman, former Secretary of Agriculture, describes the government's pro-biotech mindset: "You felt like you were almost an alien, disloyal, by trying to present an open-minded view. . . . So I pretty much spouted the rhetoric. . . . It was written into my speeches." In Seeds of Deception Smith offers easy-to-understand descriptions of genetic engineering and explains why it can result in serious health problems. This well-documented, pivotal work will show you how to protect yourself and your family.

Customer Reviews:

A good reason to eat organic and avoid processed foods.......2007-09-18

Jeffrey Smith has done an excellent job in exposing the truth about genetically modified foods. Seeds of Deception is easily understandable, compelling and well documented. It's disheartening that the people in control of the food supply are so focused on their bottom line and don't seem to care about the long-term health and safety effects of introducing foreign genes into the food supply. Genetically engineered ingredients are already in foods on the grocery store shelves right now. If you care about your health, you need to read this book, avoid processed foods and buy organic.

A must read.......2007-06-22

About three years ago I saw a "debate" about genetically modified food on public television. The panel had two people who were gung ho in favor of GMO food, and one who was on the fence about it, an appalling lack of balance. Just yesterday I was telling someone that, sadly, I no longer eat Hersheys because they've started using genetically modified ingredients, and he replied "what's that?" The lack of news or discussion of this issue in the past decade has left most people completely in the dark about what's going on. This book could save the planet if enough people read it. We are our genes. Humans, animals and plants have survived by our genetic makeup. Our relationships with plants and animals is based on our genetics and theirs. The unadvertised, sadly un-discussed mutilation of the genetic heritage of our natural world is a planetary suicide that has just begun. I recommend this book to anyone who would like to understand the GMO movement, its history, its motivations, its scandals and its dangers.

If you think GM foods are safe, think again........2007-04-12

I have not tracked the genetically engineered food issue carefully, having only seen mainstream media reporting.

BEFORE I started reading this book, I thought that:

1. The genetic engineering technique is very precise and duplicatable, inserting single genes into a plant's DNA that do a precise job.

2. Genetically modified (GM) food is essentialy the same as the non-GM counterpart.

3. There are few if any known serious health risks from eating most GM food

4. GM practices can reduce pesticide use because the plant has its own pesticide. This is an environmental benefit.

5. GM food can increase yields, given the same amount of land for growing - which has been a great benefit in some third world countries.

6. There are considerable environmental risks that have probably not been ade1quately studied. For example, monarch butterflies were being harmed in GM fields.

Overall I felt that the issue was not very clear cut, there were great advantages, but caution is also advised.

AFTER I read this book, I learned that:
1. The GM technique is extremely imprecise, it is like shooting a shotgun of genes at a bunch of DNA strands, and hoping a few stick. Furthermore, the surrounding genes suffer considerable collateral damage that is impossible to predict the effects of.

2. This collateral damage results in GM food often being very different from the non-GM version, especially in increase of toxins and allergens.

3. There are a number of well documented cases of people getting very sick, and some cases dying from these toxins and allergens.
Yet, the FDA and GM biotech industry and mainstream media continues to say that there is little evidence of health risk.

4. One of the most pervasive GM foods is Monsanto's Ready Roundup soy bean. It is specifically designed to be resistant to Monsanto's brand of pesticide. This results in MORE of that pesticide being used.

5. The argument about increased yields to save the planet is often used as a last resort when you point out the truth about GM being an imprecise technique, and that there are serious health risks. It is a way of bringing in a moral dimension that most people will buy. Yet, the planet already has much more food than it needs to feed everyone. This is not the reason for GM foods. Profit is.

6. The environmental risks may be many and unstudied, to be sure. Much more shocking is that there are hardly any careful studies demonstrating that GM food is safe. Basically, scientificaly weak arguments are use to argue that there is no reason to conduct such studies.

This is barely scratching the surface, this book is extremely well written and documented. It tells a sobering story of:
* Corporate greed,

* Rampant conflict of interest with industry being in bed with the FDA, for example:
- Scientists warnings are routinely ignored
- Monsanto officials come to work at the FDA to make policy, then return to Monsanto
- The doctoring of information is much like what the current Bush adminstration has done with scentific reports about global warming.

* Most funding for research in GM comes from industry.

* People are afraid to do research that might discover inconvenient truths about the safety of GM foods - because they are bullied, threatened and can lose their careers.

* Massive media manipulation filters out virtually all anti-GM stories; books have gone unpublished for fear of lawsuits by pro-GM companies

* Pro-biotech companies and the FDA itself have ample evidence of safety concerns, and they consistently lie about it. It reminds me of the tobacco situation.

Some may complain that this book does not present a balanced view. You be the judge. And anyway, even if it is one one-sided, its about that that this side was aired.

But don't take it from me, or from the author. Read the book, check the references, and reach your own conclusions. Even if only a few things in this book are true, it has major consequences.

I recommend that anyone who cares about their health, and their future read this book right away!!! You are not going to find out about this information from the mainstream media.

No one is harder to teach..........2007-03-29

...than someone whose job depends on not understanding what you're trying to tell them!

Interesting how the only country in the world selling this Frankenfood is the one sufficiently industrialised (that there could be a market for something other than "just plant this seed and eat what grows out of it"), which also happens to have a government wholly bought and paid for by the megacorporations pushing this junk. In the rest of the developed world--where governments (and their regulations) are at least somewhat responnsive to the people and not just their corporate masters--no one will touch the stuff. They won't pay a penny for it. They're literally fighting to keep it fron contaminating their food supply.

Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this one out. And yes, what is the "balanced" view? OK, in this chapter we take a look at the benefits of putting untested weird gene-tweaked crap into your body and the biosphere...

What americans don't know..........2007-02-17

...is that biotech companies are stealing your right to decide what you want to eat!
This book reviews - among other subjects - how a handful of multibillion companies are mixing their genetically modified ingredients into the food you and your children eat - without your knowledge. And worse: aided and abetted by the FDA.
If you care about your consumer rights, this book is an eye-opener. In this case the old saying that "what you don't know can never hurt you" proves absolutely wrong.
People in the EU have already given GMO foods the bashing they deserve. But not people in the US. Want to know why? The info is in this book.

Mandated Landscape: British Imperial Rule in Palestine 1929-1948

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A nice study

Mandated Landscape: British Imperial Rule in Palestine 1929-1948
Roza El-Eini
Manufacturer: Frank Cass
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0714654264

Book Description

This work examines the construction of post-Soviet political space, geopolitical discourses and boundaries in Estonia. Making use of innovative methodological solutions such as Q-methodology, its analysis includes in-depth interviews in order to elucidate a variety of issues through human experience and subjective perception, such as Estonian-Russian border disputes of the 1990s, inter-ethnic issues and national integration and security.
As Estonia is one of the frontline EU accession countries and is queuing for membership of NATO, the book raises broad questions of post-Soviet geopolitics in the Baltic region and across Europe. Indeed, the book argues that small states such as Estonia should be understood as active participants in post-Soviet and European geopolitics, and not simply pawns in a superpower environment.

Customer Reviews:

A nice study.......2007-03-17

This is a compact and important study of all the aspects of landscape during the Palestine Mandate(1917-1948). It covers agriculture, Land laws, forestry, the land system, the partition plans and there is a special case study of the Shephalah, the Palestine Piedmont area on the Coastal plain. An important contribution to the field of study of Palestine in the 20th century, an excellent and interesting view of the Mandate, one that seperates politics from reality, a welcomed addition therefore to reading on Palestine and the land that became Israel.

Seth J. Frantzman

Saving the Planet With Pesticides and Plastic: The Environmental Triumph of High-Yield Farming

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Finally! Ignorance has a manual!
Great work about this subject
This is crazy
Save the Science
unbelievable

Saving the Planet With Pesticides and Plastic: The Environmental Triumph of High-Yield Farming
Dennis T. Avery
Manufacturer: Hudson Institute
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Binding: Paperback

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Customer Reviews:

Finally! Ignorance has a manual!.......2006-08-17

This book is testimony to the ignorance of many men. This book is written by a man who profits from plastics and pesticides. It cannot be trusted in the least. All of the data goes against common sense. This is one of those books that will have a place in museums in future years, showing future generations how and why our earth is in the state of chaos it will surely be in thanks to garbage like this.

Great work about this subject.......2006-05-13

I'm a brazilian and (unemployed) agronomist.This book is really good about this subject.This books shows to the general public, many realities about pesticides and his goods efects in economy and farms.The GREEN MAFIA is also quacking in USA, not only in Brazil.

This is crazy.......2005-05-31

Pesticide is a poison. If you think spraying poison on our food is going to improve anything, you've got another think coming. Sustainable agriculture puts back what it takes from the environment. Factory farming pollutes our air, water and soil. According to a study conducted by the Department of Economics at the University of Essex , industrial farms cause $34.7 billion worth of environmental damage in the U.S. each year. True, there have been cases of E. coli bactiria, but the is the result of improper handling, using fresh manure instead of allowing it to decompose properly first. And it isn't only organic foods that were grown in maure. And non-organic food is also sometimes grown in manure. And the pesticides kill bugs, not E. coli bacteria.

Recent studies have shown that sustainable crops contain higher levels of nutrients, minerals, and antioxidants, including vitamin C, iron, magnesium, phosphorus, and polyphenols. Organic crops also have lower levels of certain toxic heavy metals. Better soil management (crop rotation, cover crops and composting) used in organic and sustainable farming helps enrich the soil and increase the concentration of vitamins and minerals in the plants. Chemical fertilizers, used on conventional, factory farmed crops, lower the nutrient content of the soil, increase the level of potentially harmful nitrates, and can contain certain toxic heavy metals which can be absorbed by the plants.

Pesticides are one of the most common toxic substances found in food. They can impair the immune system and cause diseases.

Pesticides can also affect the nervous system, endocrine (glands and hormones) system, immune system and reproductive system. Pesticides have been linked to Parkinson's disease, learning disabilities, hyperactivity, emotional disorders, weakened immune systems, and birth defects. Long after their use, pesticides remain in the soil and water. Despite being banned in 1972, DDT has been found in the breast milk of over 99% of all mothers in America. The American Association of Poison Control Centers estimates that in 2002, 69,000 children suffered from pesticide related poisoning or exposure to poisonous pesticides. According to Cornell entomologist David Pimentel, "It has been estimated that only 0.1% of applied pesticides reach the target pests, leaving the bulk of the pesticides (99.9%) to impact the environment."

Save the Science.......2004-11-16

Growing more per area is responsible for saving more land to the nature and High-yield Conservation is supported by two nobel peace prize laureates (Dr Norman Borlaug and Dr Oscar Arias) and many others. See the declaration at http://www.highyieldconservation.org/. The book's tittle is a bit "drama oriented" in my oppinion: it seems that Mr Avery is trying to use the same tool that most environmentalist do.

unbelievable.......2004-10-14

The reviews I have seen here reflect more ignorance than I have encountered in a long time. Dennis T. Avery apparently doesn't know the first thing about human and environmental health, and unfortunately there are enough gullible Americans out there to perpetuate such blatantly self-indulgent ideas. It's ok not to care about your own health (with the environment and soil quality at its foundation), but not to consider the health of others is just irresponsible.

Food Is Different: Why the WTO Should Get out of Agriculture (Global Issues)

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Review by GRAIN

Food Is Different: Why the WTO Should Get out of Agriculture (Global Issues)
Peter M. Rosset
Manufacturer: Zed Books
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ASIN: 1842777556
Release Date: 2006-10-17

Book Description

Peter Rosset argues that what is at stake is the very future of our global food system, of each country's unique agricultural and farming systems, and the livelihoods of rural people in both the rich industrial countries and the South. He unravels the complex ways in which agriculture in the North is supported, subsidized etc. and argues for the future of agriculture to be taken completely out of the WTO's ambit since food is not just another commodity, but something which goes to the heart of human livelihood, local cultures and national security.

Customer Reviews:

Review by GRAIN.......2007-02-07

"I am 56 years old, a farmer from South Korea. I have mostly failed, as many other farm leaders elsewhere have failed. We cannot seem to do anything to stop the waves that have destroyed our communities, where we have been settled for hundreds of years. I have tried to find the real reason and the real force behind those waves. And I have reached the conclusion, here in front of the WTO.

Our fears became reality in the marketplace. We soon realised that, despite our best efforts, we could never match the prices of cheap imports. We became aware that our farm size, 1.3 hectares on average, is a mere one-hundredth of the farms in the large exporting countries. Since massive importing began, we small farmers have never been paid as much as our production costs. Sometimes prices would drop fourfold, all of a sudden.

The farmers who gave up early went to urban slums. Others who tried to escape from the vicious cycle have met with bankruptcy due to accumulated debts. For me, I couldn't do anything but look around at the vacant houses in the village, old and decaying. Once I went to a house where a farmer took his life by drinking a toxic chemical because of his uncontrollable debts. I could do nothing but listen to the howling of his wife."

This is an edited version of the statement distributed by Lee Kyung Hae shortly before he took his own life on 16 September 2003 in Cancún, Mexico, in the mass protests against the World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks. In the early 1990s, after the Korean government had dismantled trade barriers and the market had been flooded with very cheap imported food, millions of farmers lost their farms. For many, the shame brought by losing their ancestral land was unbearable. Peter M. Rosset dedicates this book* to Lee Kyung Hae.

Rosset, a food rights activist and rural development specialist, has written a clear and extremely accessible account of the impact of trade liberalisation on farming and, more particularly, on small farmers throughout the world. Much of the material is well known, but Rosset provides flashes of insight. For instance, he questions the widely held assumption that it is the high level of subsidies that the US and the European community pay to their farmers that makes their produce so cheap. It might seem logical, he says, to blame subsidies, when you see very cheap American maize flooding the Mexican market, but it is wrong: it mistakes cause for effect. Subsidies are triggered by weak commodity prices, not vice versa.

The main cause of the low prices, he says, is the power of the agri-food conglomerates. These have a vested interest in paying as little as possible for their raw materials (crops and livestock) and they use their huge influence within state bureaucracies to stop governments applying effective policies as in the past to regulate supply and demand. As a result, commodity prices continue to drop, often way below production costs, even in the industrialised countries. Thousands of small farmers are put out of business and the governments have to subsidise the big farmers to keep them producing.

Rosset, who lives in Chiapas, Mexico, has an interesting section on the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA). Because of the cheap US maize pouring into Mexico as a result of NAFTA, Mexican peasant farmers cannot sell their produce. Yet, he says, almost three million mostly poor farmers stubbornly continue to grow maize. How is this possible? Quoting a Mexican study, Rosset says that it happens only because of the remittances sent by migrants in the US, who are in effect subsidising Mexican production. Their action, he says, reflects the peasants' deep cultural resistance to the dislocation and destruction caused by the `free trade' model.

The section of the book concerning the `uniqueness' of food, which leads to the book's title, is the least convincing. Food is not just any merchandise or commodity, say Rosset; it "means rural livelihoods, traditions and cultures and it means preserving, or destroying, rural landscapes". Because it is special, he says, food should not be covered by WTO agreements. But is food so different? Isn't it just as damaging for a country to have its industry and its culture destroyed by cheap imported goods? It is the free trade model as a whole that needs to be rethought, not only its application to farming.

* Peter M. Rosset, Food is different - why we must get the WTO out of agriculture, 2006, joint publication: Canada: Fernwood Publishing; India: Books for Change; Malaysia: SIRD; Southern Africa: David Philip; Rest of the World: Zed Books

Promise Unfulfilled: Unions, Immigration, and the Farm Workers (ILR Press Books)

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Promise Unfulfilled: Unions, Immigration, and the Farm Workers (ILR Press Books)
Philip L. Martin
Manufacturer: ILR Press
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In 1975, after vigorous campaigning by the United Farm Workers union, the state of California passed Agricultural Labor Relations Act (ALRA), a pioneering self-help strategy granting farm workers the right to organize into unions. A quarter century later, only a tiny percentage of farm workers in the state belong to unions, and wages remain less than half of those of nonfarm employees. Why did the ALRA fail? One of the nation's foremost authorities on farm workers here explores the reasons behind its unfulfilled promise.

Philip L. Martin examines the key features of the farm labor market in California, including the shifting ethnicity of the worker pool and the evolution of the major unions, beginning with the Wobblies. Finally, he reviews the impact of immigration on agriculture in the state.

Today, many states look to the California experience to assess whether the ALRA can serve as a model for their own farm labor relations laws. In Martin's view, California's efforts to grant rights to farm workers so that they can help themselves have failed because of continued unauthorized migration and the changing structure of farm employment. Martin argues that alternative policies would make farming profitable, raise farm worker wages, and still keep groceries affordable.

Coherence of Agricultural And Rural Development Policies: The Development Dimension
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Coherence of Agricultural And Rural Development Policies: The Development Dimension

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Markets and States in Tropical Africa: The Political Basis of Agricultural Policies (California Series on Social Choice and Political Economy)
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Straightforward, seminal - - if perhaps too simple

A Testimony to Dependent Development

Rational Choice Approcah to African Agricultural Crisis

Extracting Rents Away from the Agricultural Sector

Explains how states affect market operations in Africa

Markets and States in Tropical Africa: The Political Basis of Agricultural Policies (California Series on Social Choice and Political Economy)
Robert H. Bates
Manufacturer: University of California Press
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Most Africans live in rural areas and derive their incomes from farming; but because African governments follow policies that are adverse to most farmers' interests, these countries fail to produce enough food to feed their populations. Markets and States in Tropical Africa analyzes these and other paradoxical features of development in modern Africa and explores how governments have intervened and diverted resources from farmers to other sectors of society. A classic of the field since its publication in 1981, this edition includes a new preface by the author.

Customer Reviews:

Straightforward, seminal - - if perhaps too simple.......2007-08-07

This book examines a simple and important puzzle: why do African governments choose such terrible economic policies? These policies are especially bad for agriculture, even though most Africans are farmers.

The answer is simple: African governments systematically favor urban interests. That means that they provide cheap food for urban workers, which means cheap labor for urban businesses (capital). These groups are outnumbered, but they live in the cities. This means that labor and capital can mobilize politically against the government in the capital city, while farmers - - who are scattered all over a large countryside with poor transportation links - - find it very difficult to pressure the government.

Bates' basic claim has much to recommend it. It is simple, yet it served as a productive research agenda for other studies - - such as Michael Lofchie's comparison of Kenya and Tanzania, among others. It is no wonder that this book made Bates' reputation, and was a seminal contribution to political economy in its day.

Its simplicity also makes the argument incomplete. Though he does discuss colonial legacies, Bates doesn't consider the wider international context. African countries would find it difficult to pursue pro-farmer policies because the rich world, especially in Europe and Japan, closes its markets to many African food products. Certainly this fact deserves to play an important role when we consider the poor choices that African governments make.

A Testimony to Dependent Development.......2007-04-26

The decolonization of Africa was espoused by two ideals of the African people: political independence and economic development. The African nationalists attributed their economic backwardness to their colonial heritage and believed that `independence' would pave the way to prosperity. Yet facing the dilemmas of economic development and the limitations of the international system, they eventually ended up with inefficient industrial firms, impoverished peasantry, and increased economic inequality.

Robert Bates' Markets and States in Tropical Africa analyzes the reasons for and the mechanism of state intervention in market in African states. Like every other country who has attempted to develop so far, independent African countries too faced the dilemmas of economic development, namely capital accumulation and market creation. The economies of Africa have been overwhelmingly rural in nature and the governing elites in Africa aimed to change this situation by through industrialization. The scarcity of capital led national elites to extract resources from agriculture and channel them into manufacture and industry. What is important here, as Bates emphasize, is that all nations seeking to industrialize have done this: "The African policies are thus notable not as exceptions but as examples of a larger class," (p. 119). The forms of economic manipulation were compatible with the prevailing economic doctrines: industry is the engine of growth, savings come from the profits of industry, rural sector should be squeezed for development, etc. (p. 97).

The African governments had both economic and political incentives to channel resources from the rural agricultural sector to the urban industrial enterprises. On the one side they regarded this as necessary for the industrialization and economic development of their countries; on the other side, "the politicization of the electorate" in the nationalist era pushed the governing elite to follow clientalist policies to maintain their political status. As Bates put is, the resources allocated through governmental programs have been channeled to those "whose support is politically useful or economically rewarding to the state - that is, to members of the elite," (p. 56).

As for the instruments of state intervention in the market, African governments mostly exploited taxes, tariffs, and subsidies to transfer resources from rural areas to urban ones. Government in Africa subsidized fertilizers, seeds, mechanical equipments, land, and credit for commercial farming (p. 50). The taxes collected from the rural areas constituted the bulk of these subsidies given to the urban and rural elites. Also, to promote industrial development, African governments constructed protective barriers between the world and domestic markets which sheltered local industries from foreign competition (p. 66). Apparently, the peasantry has been the victim of both policies.

The history of African economic development in the post-independence era in general and Robert Bates' book in particular demonstrate the inevitability of the sacrifices and burden that at least one class should undertake. Historically speaking, these classes have usually been peasantry and workers. A capitalist economic development necessitates the accumulation of capital in the hands of a capitalist entrepreneur class, which forces the state to intervene in the market and to channel resources from the lower strata to the upper ones. Neither the developed Western countries nor the East Asian NICs escaped this necessity of economic development. Yet what made these countries `overcome' the aforementioned dilemma and eventually become a `success story' were the availability of `external resources and market' at their disposal. While in the Western case the cheap labor, food, and market of what is now called the Third World made possible the redemption of the agonies of the peasantry and the eventual establishment of `welfare states', in the `Asian miracle' case, their privileged access to the Western markets provided the `fuel' to keep their economic growth and to gradually relieve the burden of the peasantry and working class in these countries. It was not the intervention of the state in the market that differed the African case from the `success' stories, rather it was the unavailability of external means that determined the eventual fates of African countries.

Rational Choice Approcah to African Agricultural Crisis.......2006-07-28

In this work, Bates moves away from dependency theory in explaining the financial discrepancies between the Center and Periphery. Rather than concentrating on external catalysts to stalled development, Bates rational-actor model concentrates on the internal problems facing African development, particularly the pursuit of interests on the part of political and urban elites.

Much of Africa is facing an agricultural crisis. Although generally populated by small farmers, many nations in Africa face food shortages. Bates argues that these crises are the result of inefficient policies (which intervene in, and distort markets) implemented by political and economic elites. The question becomes, why are these policies being pursued? Bates explains the implementation of these inefficient agricultural policies through a rational choice model. Bates suggests that these policies are developed and implemented by rational political and economic elites seeking to maximize their own utility - particularly in regards to garnering political support - rather than pursing the collective good. This often occurs at the expense of many small farmers. He writes, "Policies are designed to secure the advantages of particular interests, to appease powerful political forces, and to enhance the capacity of political regimes to remain in power" (5-6).

The political and urban elites work in tandem to harvest economic resources garnered from the agricultural sector to promote industrialization. This is often done through the manipulation of market forces, particularly in keeping food prices low for urban interests. Doing so keeps the urban masses content, and allows industrialists to maintain low wages. In turn, the policy making elites garner political support. Bates spells out the beneficiaries of such policies clearly. "Owners and workers in industrial firms, economic and political elites, privileged farmers and the mangers of public bureaucracies - these constitute the development coalition in contemporary Africa" and hence benefit from the inefficient policies.

In regards to production, such policies skew the incentive structure of smaller agricultural producers. When receiving below world market prices, farmers will lower production, in turn limiting food supply. Or farmers may pursue a policy of "out-migration" and moved to the urban areas in pursuit of jobs. In this regard, the peasants are too acting rationally according to Bates model. Bates also discusses the problems of mass organization in order to oppose these policies. The small farmers are so dispersed and politically weak that the collective action problems ensue. The government expands on these collective action problems by offering preferential disbursements of subsidies, etc. to those who tow the party line. This divide and conquer technique has limited the power of the rural masses to organize a coherent oppostion.

Extracting Rents Away from the Agricultural Sector.......2005-12-05

In this landmark study, Robert Bates offered an interpretation of African economic policies toward the agriculture sector that set the terms of the debate for the years to come. Why do African governments pursue policies that create market distortions, skewed incentives and misallocation of resources, despite their obvious costs for social welfare and long-term development? The core of Robert Bates' argument is that bad economics often makes good politics: governments choose to pursue policies that are clearly irrational from an economic viewpoint because their economic and social costs are more than offset by the political benefits that accrue to them and to the social forces that maintain them in power.

Things did not have to turn that way. Political elites who took power at the time of the independences sincerely believed that they could put their countries on a path to economic modernization and social well-being. What trapped Africa into a low equilibrium of narrow clientelism and entrenched self-interests was a mix of bad institutions, bad advice and bad luck.

African governments inherited from their colonizers institutions that were set to extract rents from the agriculture sector rather than to maximize the welfare of farmers. They chose a mix of development policies that emphasized the role of the state and the importance of a nascent manufacturing sector. And they benefited from a period of high commodity prices that led them to consider cash crops and natural resources as an inexhaustible source of foreign exchange revenue.

The institution that came to symbolize the rent-extracting nature of African agriculture policies is the marketing board, which purchased cash crops from farmers at administratively determined prices and then sold them for a higher price on the world market, thereby accumulating funds that could be used for state-sponsored industrial projects or for social subsidies, if not for outright plundering. Another instrument of redistribution away from the agriculture sector was the local industrial firm that processed raw agricultural products acquired at artificially low prices, or the importation of foreign crops at prices below domestic ones in order to feed urban workers and lower the cost of living.

This complex web of policies and institutions should not be seen solely as a way to transfer resources away from agriculture into the modern urban economy, thereby achieving the "primitive accumulation" that Marxist economists saw as a condition to industrial development. Some policies, such as large irrigation projects, the subsidization of inputs, the channeling of credit or the extension of public services to rural areas, benefit large landowners at the expense of small-scale farmers. Likewise, industrial development projects under protective trade policies give rise to large, capital intensive public enterprises which often operate below capacity and at high costs.

Robert Bates makes heavy use of interest group theory to explain how policies are designed to secure advantage for particular interests, to appease powerful political forces, and to enhance the capacity of political regimes to remain in power. More ground-breaking is his analysis of the market as the setting for the struggle between the peasant and the state, the political arena in which social forces collide or avoid each other. Through intervention in the market, the state seeks to levy resources from the countryside, to appease social unrest in urban areas and to serve the private interests of those in power. For their part, rural producers use the market as a means of defense against the state, thereby evading some of the adverse consequences of government policies. They do so in part by reducing output, shifting crops, migrating out of the countryside, returning to subsistence lifestyles or joining the informal sector. Consequently, policy aberrations on the part of the government are more likely to result in exit patterns than in attempts at reforms.

This book has been vilified in some quarters because it was said to have provided the intellectual blueprint to the policies of structural adjustment that swept African countries soon after its publication. The denunciation of the urban bias and the abolition of the marketing boards certainly provided a rallying cry that was easily picked up by market reformers working from development agencies, with little consideration to the social forces that would be put in motion by such prescriptions. And it is true that Bates is almost entirely silent on the organizational characteristics of his interest group coalitions that underpin policy choices and institutional settings. But this classic work still provides many insights on Africa's internal and external structural problems.

Explains how states affect market operations in Africa.......2000-10-31

This book nicely presents the way that African governments influence markets, why they do so, and the effect of their involvement on citizens, especially the poor. I found it helpful in explaining why some states make the decisions they do, despite the fact that they might not always be the most economically efficient.

U.S. Agricultural Response to Income Taxation

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A Recommended Read!

U.S. Agricultural Response to Income Taxation
Hoy Fred Carman
Manufacturer: Iowa State Press
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A Recommended Read!.......2001-11-26

Dr. Carman's research is thorough, well written and concisely presented. A worthwile read for those who are interested in the discourses of agriculture, economics and politics.
"U.S. Agricultural Response to Income Taxation is the first extensive look at how income tax policy affects agriculture in the U.S. Surveying a significant body of research, Carman documents the effects of federal income tax on production and investment decisions in agriculture, farm size, and, prior to 1986's tax reform act, tax-shelter investments by non-farmers.
Guiding a reader through tax and farm policy with helpful flow charts and graphs, Carman discusses the impact of income taxes on land prices; decisions regarding machinery and equipment, orchards, and livestock; management practices that take advantage of cash accounting; capital gains tax and depreciation provisions; and tax equity. He also examines the interactions of income taxes with social security taxes, estate and gift taxes, and corporate income taxes.
This book concludes with a timely review of how various tax proposals, from a fiat tax to a consumption tax, might affect farmers and agriculture in the U.S." U of I press

Agricultural Policy for the 21st Century

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Agricultural Policy for the 21st Century

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ASIN: 0813808995

Agroforestry in Sustainable Agricultural Systems (Advances in Agroecology)

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Agroforestry in Sustainable Agricultural Systems (Advances in Agroecology)

Manufacturer: CRC
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ASIN: 1566702941

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Agroforestry in Sustainable Agricultural Systems examines the environmental and social conditions that affect the roles and performance of trees in field- and forest-based agricultural production systems. Various types of ecological settings for agroforestry are analyzed within temperate and tropical regions. The roles of soil, water, light, nutrient and pest management in mixed, annual, woody perennial and livestock systems are discussed. Important new case studies from around the world offer innovative strategies that have been used successfully in raising forests and tree products on a sustainable basis for commercial harvesting and for providing other environmental services in land conservation and watershed management.

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