When Policy Responses Make Things Worse: The Case of Export Restrictions on Agricultural Products

Presentation made at the ICAE 2024, on August 7th, in Delhi.

I discuss the impacts, and motivations, of export restrictions on agricultural products.

1. When Policy Responses Make Things Worse: The Case of Export Restrictions on Agricultural Products Abdullah Mamun, IFPRI David Laborde, FAO Agrifood Economics and Policy Division 1 https://hdl.handle.net/10568/140687 Mamun, Abdullah; and Laborde Debucquet, David. 2024. Role of international price and domestic inflation in triggering export restrictions on food commodities. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2246. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute. Laborde, David and Abdullah Mamun. 2023 When policy responses make things worse: the case of export restrictions on agricultural products. ADBI working paper No. 1386 Tokyo. https://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/publication/885671/adbi-wp1386_0.pdf

2. What is the problem? 2

3. Overview Introduction​ Primary goals ​Areas of growth Timeline ​Summary​

4. A recurrent policy response 4

5. Food crisis and export taxation: the cost of non-cooperative trade policies Why export restrictions? Terms of trade Food security and final consumption price Intermediate consumption price Public receipts Income redistribution Stabilization of domestic prices See also : Martin W, Anderson K (2012) Export restrictions and price insulation during commodity price booms. Am J Agric Econ 94(2):422–427 Antoine Bouët and David Laborde Debucquet Review of World Economics / Weltwirtschaftliches Archives Vol. 148, No. 1 (April 2012), pp. 209-233 (25 pages) At the cost of increased price volatility and Negative terms of trade effects for food importers

6. The lack of transparency remains a pervasive issue: undermining the trust in the system 6  Situation in 2022 Number/Value Percent Total number of countries who imposed restriction 28   Number of non-member countries in WTO 6   Total number of measures 66   Number of measures notified to WTO 15 25% Number of measures not notified to WTO 44 75% Number of measures coming from non-member countries 7   Number of measures notified after start date of restriction 12 80% Number of measures notified in advance or on time 3 20% Average number of days passed between start date of restriction and notification 70   Max of days passed between start date of restriction and notification 245   Min of the days passed between start date of restriction and notification 3  

7. Policies could change fast When Policy Responses Make Things Worse: The Case of Export Restrictions on Agricultural Products Indian Wheat Exports

8. Who is impacted? 8

9. Who is impacted? Staples are more often targeted Staples are more often targeted Why LDCS are more impacted? Laborde, David, Abdullah Mamun, and Marie Parent. 2020. COVID-19 Food Trade Policy Tracker [dataset]. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI)

10. Product composition - 2022 10

11. Most impacted countries in 2022 Food Export restrictions tracker developed in the early month of the COVID-19 crisis. See Laborde, Mamun and Parent (2020) and

12. Finding a solution… will start by understanding the trigger of export restrictions, not by repeating that ER are bad 12

13. 13 Food Price Index and Export Restriction Coverage in Different Episodes of Food Price Crisis

14. Food Price Index and Export Restriction Coverage in Different Episodes of Food Price Crisis

15. 15 When Policy Responses Make Things Worse: The Case of Export Restrictions on Agricultural Products Probability of implementing an ER (rice, wheat, palm oil) Mamun, Abdullah; and Laborde Debucquet, David. 2024. Role of international price and domestic inflation in triggering export restrictions on food commodities. IFPRI Discussion Paper 2246. Washington, DC: International Food Policy Research Institute.

16. Conclusions 16

17. Reality of change: 11 years for… 17 47. According to the Action Plan, we agree to remove food export restrictions or extraordinary taxes for food purchased for non-commercial humanitarian purposes by the World Food Program and agree not to impose them in the future. In this regard, we encourage the adoption of a declaration by the WTO for the Ministerial Conference in December 2011. Ministerial Decision  (2022) on exempting World Food Programme (WFP) humanitarian food purchases from export prohibitions or restrictions.

18. What to do? 18

19. Thank You 19