The Long Reach of King Cotton

Subsidies to American cotton growers are deflating prices on the global cotton market and causing great hardship for poor farmers in Africa, says this New York Times editorial. If the subsidies were removed, the paper argues, world prices would stabilize at levels that reflect real costs, African farmers would profit from their comparative advantage in cotton production, and the US would look less hypocritical when it trots the globe touting the virtues of free trade. It also might help the US boost its moral claims in fighting the war on terrorism, says Burkina Faso's President Blaise Compaoré: "America wants us to comprehend the evil posed by violent anti-Western terrorism, and we do… But we want you to equally concern yourself with the terror posed here by hunger and poverty, a form of terrorism your subsidies are aiding and abetting. If we cannot sell our cotton we will die." – YaleGlobal