Canadian Agricultural Trade: Disputes, Actions, Prospects

George Jackson is a retired professional agrologist.

This timely book, edited by Lermer (a professor and Dean of the Faculty
of Management) and Klein (an economics professor), both at the
University of Lethbridge in Alberta, is about issues in agricultural
trade policy. At the outset, the authors note that “the 1980s has been
[a decade] in which the world’s agricultural trading system has
seriously deteriorated”; this statement sets the scene.

The collection’s 13 essays are written by 20 agricultural economists
from Canada, the United States, and New Zealand. They delve into various
issues related to agricultural trade: bilateral trade negotiations and
the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, settling trade disputes, the
U.S. countervail against Canadian pork, the potato war, the countervail
case for Canadian corn, and New Zealand’s switch to a market-oriented
agricultural economy.

The book’s professional analysis provides an in-depth, balanced
review, something we don’t always find in press reports. Some of the
reviews become very technical, but each chapter contains a concise
concluding section that brings the issue into sharper focus. References
and notes are included.

University, college, and farm-organization libraries, and those
providing economic advice to the agricultural sector, will find this
work a most useful and informative addition. A book to place on your
shelf and reread as the issues come to the fore.