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Ending Farm Subsidies

IMF Presses World to Scrap Farm SubsidiesThe world economy would gain an annual boost of 128 billion dollars if lavish farm subsidies were scrapped, the IMF said in a report. Industrialized nations spent more than 300 billion dollars last year on agricultural subsidies — six times the total government aid to developing countries, the International Monetary Fund noted. [Global Policy.org]

I find it amazing how much attention “Fair-Trade coffee”:96 manages to attract by people who practically ignore this larger issue. It must be the humanizing effect of having the mental image of a person as opposed to the larger academic debate. Combined with the feeling that ending subsidies will hurt farmers with the belief that buying Fair-Trade coffee simply helps everyone (except the distributers we’re trying to cut out) and I suppose we have our explanation.