Report of the Preparatory Commission on World Food Proposals.

  • FAO Preparatory Commission on World Food Proposals
Date:
1947
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Report of the Preparatory Commission on World Food Proposals. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    resources then provided the means by, which the new countries could pay for their imports from the old. In the twentieth century the resources must be developed primarily to build up desirable economies within heavily populated countries. Consequently, it will be very difficult to develop means of inter- national payment. The solution of this problem so far as industry is con- cerned has not been within the terms of reference of our Commission, but we felt that the proposals we have made for agricultural development will be an important contribution to the wider problem. Need for International Cooperation 14. To achieve the kind of economic expansion we envisage in this Report, it will be necessary to ensure the maximum international cooperation and consultation. First, no one nation could undertake the task of agricultural and industrial development over such great areas of the earth, even if that were desirable. It can be done only by a combined use of material resources as well as of knowledge and technical skills. Secondly, the age of great new several reasons and particularly, in the last few years, to mobilize national resources for war, governments have increasingly taken over responsibility for the direction of economic affairs. Today, the difficulty of obtaining foreign exchange in many countries is likely to extend the period of state control over international trading as well as international capital movements. Some governments license importers or exporters, and in a considerable ~ number of cases the government itself takes over the foreign trade in important products. 15. In the domain of agriculture many governments have undertaken to support farm prices or incomes for two or more years ahead and in some countries they are committed to specific production plans. To fulfil these pledges, they endeavour to keep agriculture insulated from the outside world by means of import duties, export subsidies, and other similar measures. In consequence, there are today large differences between the prices in different countries for certain staples such as wheat and sugar. For several staple foodstuffs there is no price freely arrived at on the world market, but rather a series of prices negotiated between two or miore governments. Government intervention in international trade to regulate or negotiate terms and conditions of exchange must now be recognized as a feature of the world’s economy. 16. Such developments have taken place for obvious reasons. The dangers inherent in them are equally evident both because of the dislocations inherited from two World Wars and because in the very process of constructing a new world economy and of developing the hitherto backward areas, there will be many opportunities of friction and many potential conflicts of interests. Old channels of trade will be diverted or even closed. Unless provision is made for full and frequent consultation among governments on specific economic problems, the chances of steering a successful course amidst all these difficulties will be slender. 17. [he peoples are therefore confronted with two necessities—first, economic expansion, and secondly, the organization of that expansion through coopera- tion between governments. In all the discussions of this Preparatory Com- mission we have been aware of the paramount importance of the objective © of economic expansion and we have been impressed with the growing need for even more consultation between governments than is provided for under the United Nations agencies already brought into existence and for greater coordination between these agencies. We are mindful of the fact that much is now being done to eliminate the trade restrictions and other causes that
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