Neoliberal policies implemented agriculture have pushed into a state of coma; [Source: IPS]

That pessimistic view is shared by experts on agriculture and by farmers like Mateo Rendon, the head of the Salvadoran Federation of Agrarian Reform Cooperatives (FESACORA), who blames the decline in agricultural activity over the last 15 years on "the privatisation of the banking sector, the o...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inNoticiasFinancieras p. 1
Main Author Gutierrez, Raul
Format Newsletter
LanguageEnglish
Published Miami Global Network Content Services LLC, DBA Noticias Financieras LLC 21.12.2006
Subjects
Pleitez, William
El Salvador
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:That pessimistic view is shared by experts on agriculture and by farmers like Mateo Rendon, the head of the Salvadoran Federation of Agrarian Reform Cooperatives (FESACORA), who blames the decline in agricultural activity over the last 15 years on "the privatisation of the banking sector, the opening up of the economy, and policies that have undermined national production." Other factors driving agriculture to the verge of collapse were the adoption of the U.S. dollar as El Salvador's official currency in 2001 and the implementation of the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) that the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua signed with the United States, said Rendon. CAFTA will have varying effects on the country, depending on the industry, said [William Pleitez]. "Basic grains and traditional products may very well be hurt, as they were in Mexico" as a result of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), due to the subsidies that the U.S. government shells out to its farmers and the lack of compensation policies in El Salvador, he argued.