The Making of Canadian Food Aid Policy

Raymond A. Jones is a history professor at Carleton University in
Ottawa.

This fine monograph tells the story of Canada’s disbursement of nearly
$10 billion in food aid to the Third World over the past three decades.

Food aid (generally in the form of grain shipments) is closely
associated in the public mind with the humanitarian relief of famine.
But the graphic TV images from the Horn of Africa do not tell the story
of the role played by Canadian grain surpluses in Third World
development. While food aid performs an internal function in raising
revenue for Prairie wheat farmers, its external function of assisting
Third World development is revealed here as a two-edged sword: food aid
has the potential to disrupt local production, which can contribute to
famine rather than reduce it; food aid can and has been reappropriated
and used for many purposes other than humanitarian relief.

Charlton’s book is based on extensive interviews with CIDA officials,
and is also soundly grounded in developmental literature. Your reviewer
can only endorse the comment of Cranford Pratt that this detailed,
fascinating, and revealing study is essential reading for our
understanding of Canadian food aid policy.