Non-state regulation of agricultural trade
Supported by the Australian Government, AusAID. Australian Leadership Awards Fellowships (ALAF) program
About the project
This program brings three exceptional mid-career researchers, from India, Indonesia and Viet Nam, to the University of Sydney. The School of Geosciences is the home department for Geography at the University, and a major specialisation of University of Sydney geographers relates to rural development in the Asia-Pacific. The focus of the fellowship program will be a cross-country comparative study of the local and national implications of non-state regulation in agricultural trade.
Non-state regulation of agri-food trade signals one of the most dynamic experiments in global governance of recent years, and involves private and non-governmental stakeholders in negotiating labour, health and safety, and environmental standards. Agricultural producers and exporters in developing countries are already being exposed to new forms of supply-chain regulation which are increasingly dictating how farmers gain their livelihoods, how they interact with the environment and how their local production systems and trade networks are structured.
In countries such as Indonesia, Vietnam, and India, there is generally limited understanding amongst stakeholders and policy-makers of how such non-state systems operate, and what their implications are for environmental and social governance. Importantly in this regard, these private-sector initiatives fall outside the realm of influence of both bilateral trade agreements and multilateral negotiations through the World Trade Organisation (WTO). Given the insistent rejection by the WTO to include social and environmental clauses into its existing rules and regulations, non-state regulation is quickly developing as an alternative platform for NGOs and corporate actors to promote ethical agendas. Understanding these new forms of global regulation and governance will undoubtedly be a major focus of international trade policy and rural development for developing countries in the coming years.
These evolving systems of private sector-led global governance demand that researchers develop innovative analytical tools to understand the challenges faced by traditional state-led institutions. The Fellowship Program at the University of Sydney brings together visiting Fellows to critically engage with the policy implications of changing global regulation. In doing so, they will address key themes of agricultural development, poverty reduction and natural resource management. The primary purpose of the Fellowship Program, therefore, is to encourage these leading researchers to carefully consider policy-relevant approaches to rural development consistent with a changing global trade environment. This thematic focus addresses the key development issues of economic management and trade policy.
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Participants
- From the University of Sydney
- Professor Phil Hirsch
- Dr Bill Pritchard
- Dr Jeffrey Neilson
- From India:
- Dr C.P. Gracy (University of Agricultural Sciences Bangalore)
- From Indonesia:
- Dr Bustanul Arifin (Bogor Agricultural University)
- From Viet Nam:
- Tran Ngoc Kham (Tay Nguyen University)
Geography & Agricultural Economics Workshop on Smallholders in Developing Countries
On 24 January 2008, ALAF participants and academic staff from the Disciplines of Geography and Agricultural Economics at the University of Sydney held a one-day Workshop to discuss current research and strategies for further collaborations. For a copy of the Workshop program, contact Dr Bill Pritchard.
