Chambers, Collier, Cowen et al make all the arguments you'd expect from neo-liberal economists. It's well known that small scale and organic farming is much more efficient than mechanized and industrialized GMO farming with fossil fuel based fertilizers and chemical insecticides. George Monbiot also argues in the Guardian that "peasant farmers offer the best chance of feeding the world." http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2008/06/10/small-is-bountiful/ See also his "war against small farmers" at http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2001/08/07/the-war-against-small-farms/
This critique is based on neo-classical comparative advantage theories that have been shown decades ago by economists such as Nicolas Georgescu-Roegen and Frederick Soddy to be nothing but ponzi schemes that make Bernie Madoff look like a two-bit toothpick salesman.
Bob Thomson, Ottawa
I'd be more worried that fair trade producers don't use the profits from the higher fair trade price to invest in their own eventual self-reliant food production rather than coffee or cocoa exports. Fair trade should be a transitional mechanism and not an end in itself.
Not So Fair Critique of Not So Fair Trade
Chambers, Collier, Cowen et al make all the arguments you'd expect from neo-liberal economists. It's well known that small scale and organic farming is much more efficient than mechanized and industrialized GMO farming with fossil fuel based fertilizers and chemical insecticides. George Monbiot also argues in the Guardian that "peasant farmers offer the best chance of feeding the world." http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2008/06/10/small-is-bountiful/ See also his "war against small farmers" at http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2001/08/07/the-war-against-small-farms/
This critique is based on neo-classical comparative advantage theories that have been shown decades ago by economists such as Nicolas Georgescu-Roegen and Frederick Soddy to be nothing but ponzi schemes that make Bernie Madoff look like a two-bit toothpick salesman.
Bob Thomson, Ottawa
I'd be more worried that fair trade producers don't use the profits from the higher fair trade price to invest in their own eventual self-reliant food production rather than coffee or cocoa exports. Fair trade should be a transitional mechanism and not an end in itself.