Global Distortions to Agricultural Markets : New Indicators of Trade and Welfare Impacts, 1955 to 2007

Despite recent reforms, world agricultural markets remain highly distorted by government policies. Traditional indicators of those price distortions can be poor guides to the policies' economic effects. Recent theoretical literature provides i...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Lloyd, Peter J., Croser, Johanna L., Anderson, Kym
Format: Policy Research Working Paper
Language:English
Published: 2012
Subjects:
GDP
Online Access:http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/main?menuPK=64187510&pagePK=64193027&piPK=64187937&theSitePK=523679&menuPK=64187510&searchMenuPK=64187283&siteName=WDS&entityID=000158349_20090317084405
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/4060
Description
Summary:Despite recent reforms, world agricultural markets remain highly distorted by government policies. Traditional indicators of those price distortions can be poor guides to the policies' economic effects. Recent theoretical literature provides indicators of trade and welfare-reducing effects of price and trade policies which this paper builds on to develop more-satisfactory indexes. The authors exploit a new Agricultural Distortion database to generate estimates of them for developing and high-income countries over the past half century. These better approximations of the trade and welfare effects of sector policies are generated without a formal model of global markets or even price elasticity estimates.