Cambia, todo cambia

Del IFPRI se podría hablar mucho, son muchachos que hacen ruido en el sector. Y como tales, son escuchados por los hacedores de políticas públicas de los países desarrollados.

Titularon su último informe "High Food Prices: The What, Who, and How of Proposed Policy Actions" y tiene varias perlitas. Para entusiasmarlos, les dejo sólo los primeros párrafos del resumen ejecutivo:

Executive Summary

The complex causes of the current food and agriculture crisis require a comprehensive response. In view of the urgency of assisting people and countries in need, the first set of policy actions— an emergency package—consists of steps that can yield immediate impact:

1. expand emergency responses and humanitarian assistance to food-insecure people and people threatening government legitimacy,
2. eliminate agricultural export bans and export restrictions,
3. undertake fast-impact food production programs in key areas, and
4. change biofuel policies.

A second set of actions—a resilience package—consists of the following steps:

5. calm markets with the use of market-oriented regulation of speculation, shared public grain stocks, strengthened food-import financing, and reliable food aid;
6. invest in social protection;
7. scale up investments for sustained agricultural growth; and
8. complete the Doha Round of World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations.

Algunas de estas medidas cambiarían demasiado el set de reglas con las cuales nos estamos moviendo por estos días, coyuntura que si bien no estamos aprovechando por problemas internos nos es totalmente favorable.