Iraq’s Fertile Crescent, the fabled birthplace of ancient grains and agricultural civilization, is emerging as a new market opportunity for American agribusiness. Even as U.S. officials tout gracious shipments of food aid and technical assistance to thankful Iraqi farmers, the agenda articulated by government agencies and industry groups is clear—Iraq’s fragile food sector, battered by decades of war and sanctions, is… return to article
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Reader Comments (4)Page 1 of 1 pagesWhat a bunch of crap, first the crusade, thaen the oil, now this… What the hell, is W done making money for his business buddies? What next, the cherry contract for a bologna plant in Karbala going to Halliburton Sausages, Inc.
Posted by skip on Mar 15, 2005 at 1:23 AM A very timely, well stated article. I’ve read a number of books on the food system, and am just finishing up SECRET INGREDIENTS - THE BRAVE NEW WORLD OF INDUSTRIAL FARMING, by Stuart Laidlaw, who writes for The Toronto Star.
I’m totally convinced from all that I’ve read and seen that neoliberal capitalism (privatization, deregulation of business) and industrial farming is nothing but destructive and perverted.
Posted by Arby on Mar 21, 2005 at 6:44 AM Always having know how valuable and rich Iraq’s river fed agricultural base is, I always suspected that US agribusiness opportunities would figure in at some point during the reconstruction phase of the US occupation. In the first place consistent US agricultural subsidization of Iraqi purchases of US farm products figured into the debate in the runup to Gulf War I. Bush Sr. sent $1.1 billion in agricultural credits to Iraq in late 1989, 1.5 years after the Anfal campaign against the Kurds, showing often stated US human rights concerns in Iraq to be bogus. Order 81, which arrogantly and falsely accuses the Iraqi economy of being “centrally planned” actually threatens to centralize the Iraqi agricultural sector far more than did Saddam. Beginning with the abolition of state food processing industries and subsidies which guaranteed plentiful, cheap food to the Iraqi urban population through a well co-ordinated program of land reform (which favored small and middle-holding peasants who could sell their produce to the state for processing and sale), state processing and distribution, the US solution is to hand Iraq’s agricultural sector over to US agribusiness TNCs. The neo-liberal privatization will reduce Iraqi control of farming partly by dumping US subsidized grains on the local market while introducing US terminator gene crops that rely on expensive inputs to successfully farm. This will reduce jobs and farms as it concentrates the agricultural sector and the profits toward corporate food processors, large landholders who purchase expensive inputs like seed, pesticides, and fertilizer, distributers. While making this sector highly efficient and vertically integrated it will also concentrate it and the profits from it while allowing urban food prices to skyrocket! The Iraqi people will suffer for it! Small farming will become unsustainable and overall national income will decline as a result. Economic policies which compliment these policies in other sectors according to other Bremer Orders will even more intensely globalize Iraq’s battered economy. But than again, what was this unnecessary and brutal war about in the first place?
Posted by steve on Jun 1, 2005 at 2:52 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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Posted by jacie on Mar 17, 2005 at 6:34 PM 
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