The study reviews the role of agricultural terms of trade in development and growth, whether or not at early stages of development agriculture should be taxed, and if policies should contain an anti-agriculture bias. It then reviews the ways in which anti-agriculture bias expresses itself in various countries.--Publisher's description.

The study reviews the role of agricultural terms of trade in development and growth, whether or not at early stages of development agriculture should be taxed, and if policies should contain an anti-agriculture bias. It then reviews the ways in which anti-agriculture bias expresses itself in various countries.--Publisher's description.

This volume in the 'Distortions to Agricultural Incentives' series focus on distortions to agricultural incentives from a global perspective.

The book highlights proceedings from the Berlin 2008: Agriculture and Development conference held in preparation for the World Development Report 2008.

This book takes forward our understanding of agricultural input subsidies in low income countries.

This paper explores how fiscal policy can affect medium- to long-term growth. It identifies the main channels through which fiscal policy can influence growth and distills practical lessons for policymakers. The particular mix of policy measures, however, will depend on country-specific conditions, capacities, and preferences. The paper draws on the Fund’s extensive technical assistance on fiscal reforms as well as several analytical studies, including a novel approach for country studies, a statistical analysis of growth accelerations following fiscal reforms, and simulations of an endogenous growth model.

Winner of the European Association of Agricultural Economists Book Award Food and agriculture have been subject to heavy-handed government interventions throughout much of history and across the globe, both in developing and in developed countries. Today, more than half a trillion US dollars are spent by some governments to support farmers, while other governments impose regulations and taxes that hurt farmers. Some policies, such as price regulations and tariffs, distribute income but reduce total welfare by introducing economic distortions. Other policies, such as public investments in research, food standards, or land reforms, may increase total welfare, but these policies come also with distributional effects. These distributional effects influence the preferences of interest groups and in turn influence policy decisions. Political considerations are therefore crucial to understand how agricultural and food policies are determined, to identify the constraints within which welfare-enhancing reforms are possible (or not), and finally to understand how coalitions can be created to stimulate growth and reduce poverty.