Book Description

This book outlines the steps necessary for shifting agricultural marketing decisions from the private sector to the government. In describing the deleterious effect of political involvement in agriculture and on the overall U.S. trade balance, this text attempts to reconcile past policies with future expectations. The author retraces the steps which led to the agricultural bonanza of the 1970's and the subsequent rapid decline of U.S. agriculture's profitability to the nation in the 1980's. Analysis of U.S. agricultural programs includes thorough discussion of grain exports to the Soviet Union, embargoes and their effects on markets, and the problems of the farmers themselves as they attempt to devine the next phase of U.S. foreign agricultural policy before planting. This book could be used as a guide to U.S. Government offices dealing with agricultural export trade policy, as well as undergraduate public policy and political science seminars on U.S. food policy. Includes comprehensive bibliography.