Chronicle of a Death Foretold: The End of Food Aid

Abstract:     
The paper shows that Food Aid, as a development tool, ends together with the end of cereal production surpluses in the developed countries. The first section examines the forms of Food Aid as defined by DAC of the OECD. The second section builds on the role of cereals as a commodity constituting Food Aid. The third section analyses the evolution of Food Aid in relation to the world cereal market. The fourth section analyses the changes under way at the end of the 1990s. The concluding section shows that only the World Food Programme maintains a leading role in providing emergency Food Aid and that this role is the only one that has a meaning in international development assistance.

Number of Pages in PDF File: 12

Keywords: Food Aid, Cereal Markets, Development Assistance, World Food Programme

JEL Classification: O11, O19, Q17, F13

working papers series