NEW HARVEST, OLD PROBLEMS: FEEDING THE GLOBAL SUPERMARKET
Non-traditional agro-exports, while they have proven to be profitable for foreign investor, transnational food corporations and some southern farmers, have a bitter side. As many farmers are planting only one crop, they are very vulnerable to the fickle market cycles; as NTAE's are a luxury product, changing foreign consumer tastes vary the amount demanded considerably; also, exploitation and exposure to chemical hazards (e.g. pesticides) have increased with the growth of NTAE's.
By Lori Ann Thrupp
Growing global trade is bringing North American shoppers a year-round supply of fresh mangos, artichokes. broccoli and roses, flown in from Latin America and the Caribbean. In the countries of origin, production of these fashionable “nontraditional” agro-exports (NTAEs) is booming. Hoping to overcome economic stagnation and to add diversity to “traditional” agro-exports like bananas, coffee and sugarcane, international aid agencies and local governments have been promoting these products in Latin America over the last decade. The NTAE strategy is a key part of trade liberalization and structural-adjustment policies.
The growth of nontraditional exports has had bittersweet outcomes. Among the positive effects, these products have proven very profitable for foreign investors, some enterprises in the South, and transnational food corporations. At the same time, they satisfy the appetites of Northern consumers. On the “bitter” side, NTAEs have considerable economic, social and environmental costs, repeating patterns of previous agro-export sectors. The problems are particularly serious for small-scale farmers. Although the NTAE boom has been called a “success” using macroeconomic indicators, a closer look reveals symptoms of unsustainability and inequity.
The region’s agrarian structure has historically been characterized by an inequitable distribution of resources. Large numbers of people, especially indigenous peoples, have been excluded from the benefits of economic growth marginalized on unproductive lands. In Central America, for example, large farms (over 100 acres), although representing only 7% of the total operations, control about 73% of the total agricultural land; by contrast, small farms (under five acres), although representing 78% of the total number of farms, occupy only 11% of the total land.[1] In some areas of Latin America, this dualism is being broken down, yet the polarity still prevails in the region.
Agriculture has formed the foundation for Latin American and Caribbean economies for centuries. Coffee, bananas, and sugarcane were the main agricultural exports for most countries. Large plantations of these commodities date back to the 1700s and 1800s. Over time, countries expanded into cotton, beef, and cacao for export. During the 1960s and 1970s, although most countries adopted an inward-oriented model of import-substitution industrialization (ISI), they continued to depend largely on export agriculture, even into the 1980s and 1990s.
In many countries, agro-exports occupy the largest portions of agricultural land. Much of this agribusiness is foreign-owned, especially in Central America. The main features of the agro-export economy include dominance of large-scale monocultural plantations, high inputs of chemicals, dependency on volatile Northern markets, and the exploitation of both natural resources and low-wage labor. While traditional exports have enjoyed dynamic growth and high profitability over time, these conditions have left a legacy of short-lived export “booms” followed by economic “busts.” They have also caused degradation of natural resources, exploited labor, and exacerbated inequities.
During the early 1980s, the region suffered a serious economic crisis. Dependency on a small set of traditional exports made the Latin American and Caribbean economies vulnerable and unstable. Declining commodity prices, global recession, declining terms of trade, and trade protectionism cut into the region’s economic earnings. In response to the crisis, most of the region diversified into nontraditional, high-value products.
The purpose of NTAE promotion policies and programs, from the perspectives of development agencies and governments, is to generate foreign exchange for repaying the debt, diversify the economy to reduce dependence on low-priced traditional exports, increase agribusiness and export earnings, generate employment, and in general, revitalize economic growth. In Colombia and Bolivia, where narcotics production is prevalent, development agencies are eager to develop NTAEs as high-value alternatives to coca.
Chile and Mexico were pioneers in the NTAE sector. Their movement into this sector preceded the regional diversification of the 1980s and 1990s. Between 1962 and 1988, Chile’s fruit exports expanded 26-fold, with earnings growing from $19.9 million to $473 million (in constant 1985 dollars).[2] Following a similar model, Mexico’s fresh vegetable sector was developed by U.S. transnational companies in the 1960s. This was followed by the rapid expansion in Mexico of large agribusinesses in strawberries and tomatoes for export to the United States in the late 1970s. Recently, the most remarkable agricultural growth in Latin America has been in such high-value crops as flowers, fresh and processed fruits (particularly mangos, melon. pineapples, passion fruit, and berries), and vegetables (such as broccoli, snow peas, asparagus, mini-squash, and artichokes).
The growth of NTAEs since the first half of the 1980s in Latin America and the Caribbean has been strongly supported by international financial agencies, particularly the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and by the U.S. Agency for International Development (U.S.AID). For example, in fiscal year 1992, U.S.AID spent nearly $119 million on agribusiness worldwide, the large majority of which was for nontraditional crops.[3]
Local goverments have also established a variety of policy reforms and institutional support for NTAEs since the late 1980s. These include export facilitation procedures, new tax policies intended to stimulate NTAE growth, and with the assistance of international financial agencies, increased credit for NTAEs.[4] Policies and programs have also been developed to improve capacities for marketing, transport, and infrastructure for NTAEs. These include advertising and publicity campaigns, trade fairs, quality control, provision of price information, setting up joint ventures or trading companies, and helping to establish cold-storage facilities and port warehouses.
Innovations in products, production processes, and distribution systems (mainly through investments of foreign capital), and tile increasing globalization of transnational agribusinesses have favored growth in this sector as well.[5] International information and communication systems also facilitate efficient product turnover and help minimize losses mainly for large producers who have access to such networks. Additional supply-side inducements for investment in NTAEs are the conventional conditions of “comparative advantage” in tropical countries, including relatively low labor and land-rent costs compared to those in Northern countries, and favorable climatic conditions and tropical soils.[6]
International and regional trade agreements, particularly the Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI), established in 1983, the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) of 1976, and the Andean Trade Preference Act (TPA), passed in 1991, provide influential export incentives. They allow products to enter the U.S. market duty-free or under reduced tariffs.[7] The provisions of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) also encourage expansion of agricultural exports, mainly by reducing trade barriers that affect vegetable and fruit markets.
The growth rate of the nontraditional agro-export industry has been impressive. From the mid-to-late 1980s, NTAEs grew 222% in Chile, and 348% in Costa Rica.[8] In Paraguay, the value of NTAEs nearly tripled during the 1980s, and in Guatemala, the value of NTAEs more than doubled between 1986 and 1990.[9] Of course, NTAEs still represent a relatively small proportion of exports compared to the traditional exports from Latin America. It is unlikely that they will ever (nor are they intended to) approach the values of coffee, cotton, beef, and bananas. The net revenues and returns per acre of NTAEs are, however, remarkably high, especially compared to traditional staple foods. For example, world prices for sorghum, maize and wheat in recent years have ranged from $75 to $175 per metric ton, while many NTAE fresh fruit and vegetable products have international prices of $500 or more per metric ton.[10]
Many producers have enjoyed unprecedented revenues from these new crops, which has translated into increased foreign-exchange earnings and rising GDP. These economic benefits appear to be working towards structural-adjustment aims. The growth of NTAEs has also spawned the growth of numerous businesses for transport, supplies, packaging, marketing, and intermediary brokers for NTAEs.
The main beneficiaries of NTAE growth are large companies, which include both transnational corporations and large national and foreign investors. Many of the crops are highly technology- and capital-intensive, which usually limits them to wealthy enterprises. In Central America, for example, multinational corporations account for approximately 25% of the total production of NTAEs.[11] They also handle distribution and transport for a large percentage of the exports. The transnational business is strongest in fruits and vegetables. For example, Del Monte in Costa Rica and Dole in Honduras market almost all of the pineapple exported from these countries.[12] These companies directly produce the majority of the pineapple, and contract the rest with medium and large national growers.
Besides the transnational corporations, another important category of NTAE enterprises are large and medium-sized businesses. They include foreign entrepreneurs mainly from the United States, large and medium-sized national producers, and shippers who are not directly involved in production. These empresarios account for an estimated 40% of the NTAEs front Central America. Foreign investors have a highly prominent role. In Costa Rica, foreign investors dominate the production of flowers, ornamental plants, citrus fruits, and macadamia nuts. Of the 14 largest flower growers, only two are Costa Rican.
The scale issue in certain NTAE crops, especially flowers and specialty vegetables, poses a paradox, because the average farm size for many of these crops is generally quite small. For example, the average size of Ecuador’s flower plantations is under 25 acres. Yet, contrary to what might be expected, these producers are not typical “smallscale” resource-poor farmers. Rather, they are highly capitalized entrepreneurs. Each flower plantation requires a capital investment of at least $80,000 per acre, as well as very costly marketing and sophisticated transport systems.[13]
Resource-poor farmers usually have considerable difficulties competing in the NTAE market. In nearly all countries, they lack access to the credit, capital, and information required for success in the business. They also tend to be unfamiliar with the crops and the production technology. Gaining entry in the market is very difficult for poor farmers in many countries like Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Costa Rica, where NTAE programs have given very little attention to such matters. Even if resource-poor farmers do get involved in NTAE production, they often act squeezed out of the competition over time.
On the other hand, small-scale resource-poor producers have benefited considerably from NTAEs in certain countries and contexts, especially where they are organized in cooperatives or groups. Guatemala provides a unique illustration of substantial involvement of such farmers in NTAEs. In that country, 90% of snow peas are grown by relatively poor farmers on very small farms-typically less than two acres.[14] The competitiveness of small farmers in these crops is largely due to relatively low labor requirements, low land rent, the use of family labor, and the fact that these producers are more likely to be organized into associations.
Bolivia also has substantial involvement of small-scale resource-poor farmers in NTAE production. Bolivia has a history of communal traditions among the indigenous communities, which can serve as a social basis for management and organization of small farmers to successfully market NTAEs. Many Bolivian smallholders participate in the production and marketing of organic quinoa, a traditional high- protein grain crop that has been grown by the indigenous peoples for centuries.[15] In recent years, this grain has been rediscovered and increasingly demanded by natural-food consumers in North America and Europe. This new taste for quinoa has opened up a niche market and export opportunities for Andean smallholders. The farmers have traditionally produced it without chemical inputs; therefore organic production comes “naturally.”
In most Latin American countries, however, small-producer organizations for poor farmers do not exist, or when they do exist, they generally do not have sufficient resources for success in NTAEs. Moreover, they are usually dependent on external donors. Therefore, inequity in the distribution of benefits remains a serious predicament in the NTAE sector.
The nontraditional export sector is also subject to significant economic uncertainties. NTAEs are vulnerable to the risks and vagaries of the market. Prices fluctuate greatly in the NTAE market, not only over the year, but also from week to week, or even from day to day. This volatility is associated with seasonal changes, varying consumer preferences, regulations, and competition from other countries and national rivals.
The NTAE business is highly competitive, not only among national producers within a country, but also among different countries of the region and in Africa and Asia. Everyone is vying for dominance in relatively narrow niche markets. Producers also sometimes face competition with producers in the North. Related to this is the risk of market saturation. With the rapid growth of NTAEs, significant price declines have already occurred in some sectors such as snowpeas as a consequence of oversupply. The result is direct losses for exporters, and especially for producers.
Poorer NTAE farmers and businesses are particularly vulnerable to these price fluctuations and declining terms of trade. They suffer greater proportional losses compared to more affluent large businesses. They also tend to face more difficulties in responding to the market windows and changes in demand. This is partly because the smaller enterprises tend to have less bargaining power, and have less collateral or capital to buffer against downturns or losses. Moreover, small local producers tend to lack access to information, credit and other services.
NTAE farmers also suffer from a lack of diversification. At the national level, the diversity of NTAE products has increased significantly in all countries but farmers in the NTAE sector usually plant entire farmis with a single monoculture. For small farmers, this generally means converting from mixed farms with a diversity of subsistence crops into farms planted with a single export commodity. Over time, this uniform conversion can bring serious economic risks and other disadvantages. By contrast, maintaining diversity of crops within individual farms has proven benefits including spreading risks, reducing vulnerability to fluctuating prices, reducing pests and diseases, and other agroecological advantages for soils and resource nutrients.
Another important issue to consider is the distribution of economic benefits at different levels in the market chain of NTAEs. Producers ultimately receive very small percentage of the final sale. For example, a U.S. shopper spends on average 99 cents per pound on mangoes, of which about 8 cents per pound goes the producer. The producer’s costs are often very high and the net profits are usually low. The profit margins for small poor farmers are particularly low. While this pattern is true for all crops, the price gaps in the NTAE market chain are particularly wide.[16]
NTAE growth does generate employment throughout the cultivation, packaging, and marketing process. The labor requirements in different NTAEs vary considerably, but many NTAE crops entail much more labor per acre on average than traditional crops. This labor intensity is beneficial in most rural areas of Latin America, where jobs are needed. In Guatemala, for example, a recent analysis of employment generation in NTAEs, based on estimates from the Bank of Guatemala and two field studies, showed approximately 14,000 jobs in agribusiness processing firms, and about 2 1,000 full-time jobs in production. Adding to this, jobs in the “spin-off” industries were estimated at about 5,000, putting the total at around 40,000 fulltime jobs.[17] By 1991, the estimated total full-time jobs in NTAEs reached 12,400 in Costa Rica and 11,890 in Honduras.[18] Many of these jobs in NTAEs enable workers to acquire new skills, especially in processing. Certain specialization of skills can sometimes bring workers a daily wage five to ten percent more than other workers’ wages.[19]
Throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, a large proportion of workers in nontraditional agro-export sectors are women, in both production and processing.[20] This trend of increasing feminization of the rural wagelabor force is a ubiquitous change that has accompanied the globalization of food systems. Of course, women have traditionally been actively involved in subsistence farming, but the agro-export, industry gives women increasing wage-based work. In Ecuador, for example, an estimated 69.3% of workers in Ecuador’s NTAE production were female in 1991.[21] Managers interviewed in an Ecuador study said they preferred women laborers because they were better suited to and dexterous at pruning, harvesting, sorting, selecting, and packaging. The managers also stressed that women were “more submissive. obedient, capable, and honest” than men in such jobs.[22] In many cases, an important reason why managers prefer women is that they are paid lower wages than men for equivalent work, work longer hours often without overtime pay, and are rarely promoted.
Workers in the NTAE sector tend to have anpredictable hours and very long working days during peak periods. In most of the NTAE-growing countries, a high proportion of employees are temporary workers. For example, in Costa Rica and Honduras, over two-thirds of the employees in fruit and vegetable NTAE farms and processing plants are temporary workers. This means that they lack security and are subject to dismissal unexpectedly, especially during thries of market declines. Furthermore, workers are rarely unionized and are discouraged from organizing. In Guatemala, the use of child labor in the NTAE sector has become very common among smallholders.[23]
The production of NTAEs is also characterized by the heavy use of chemical inputs and pesticides. Doses of pesticide applications per unit of land greatly exceed those used in subsistence crops, and are also greater per acre than in many of the traditional export crops.
Although pesticides can bring short-term benefits in controlling pests, heavy pesticide use has several adverse impacts. First, pesticides are expensive. For example, an average flower producer in Ecuador spends an estimated $12,000 per year per acre on chemical inputs, which is over half of the total production costs.[24]
Secondly, when pesticides are applied excessively or too close to harvest time, the residues accumulate in foods at levels that exceed the tolerance standards established by the governments of importing countries. Pesticide-residue violations and detentions have been a major problem for Latin American and Caribbean NTAE exports to the United States, They have occurred more than 10,000 times in the last 10 years at U.S. entry ports.
Violations have resulted in millions of dollars in losses for the exporters and producers.[25] The most serious and frequent residue-detention problems in the region have occurred with products from Guatemala and Mexico. In Guatemalan NTAEs during the late 1980s, detention rates reached 27.3% of the total shipments.[26] Between 1990 and 1994, Guatemala’s exports were detained 3,091 times because of residue violations, resulting in total losses of about $17.7 million.[27] Mexican export crops were detained 6,223 times in the 1980s, resulting in losses of $49.5 million, and 1,391 times in the 1990s, resulting in losses of $5.9 million.
Pesticide residues also pollute the environment, particularly water sources, soils, and vegetation. This contamination can raise costs for producers or lead to social costs, though most are never calculated by producers.
Another negative impact from the continual use of pesticides in all crops is pest resistance. Through genetic selection, pests evolve to tolerate the effects of pesticides over time. As pesticides become ineffective, high economic losses ensue. Farmers then become trapped into increasing pesticide inputs in an attempt to regain control. Pesticide resistance is sometimes accompained by the death of natural pest enemies, leading to outbreaks of secondary pests. The resulting “pesticide treadmill” has affected many traditional agro-export crops in Latin America, leading to major crop losses.[28] In NTAEs, heavy use of pesticides has provoked a major problem of resistance and resurgence of white flies in Colombia and Central America. In recent years, the incidence of these insects has reached crisis proportions in some areas.
Pesticide use also puts workers’ health at risk. Increasing numbers of people are being exposed and impaired, and more are suffering acute poisonings and chronic damage. Most of the victims are agricultural workers––the poorest of those involved in NTAE production. Women workers are particularly vulnerable to problems from pesticide exposure.[29] In a recent survey of workers in Ecuador’s NTAE sector, 62% of respondents said that they had suffered health disorders from exposure to pesticides while working.[30]
The growth of NTAEs has inevitably involved changes in the use of natural resources, particularly land, vegetation, and water. Preliminary appraisals suggest that significant areas of forest cover have been cleared for NTAEs in a few areas––such as the Northern region of Costa Rica for citrus plantations, and in the Central Valley in Chile for vegetables and flowers. Perhaps more common than forest removal, the agroecological changes with NTAEs involve conversion to monocultural fanning systems and to standardized foreign varieties and uniform genetic stock, as required by Northern markets. This change often displaces the genetic diversity of indigenous varieties, and exacerbates other economic and agroecological risks.
Most of the products in the NTAE sector are highly perishable and have short shelf-lives. This elevates risks and requires specialized agricultural technologies, rapid transport systems, refrigerated storage, and sophisticated packaging procedures. These requirements raise questions about the institutional and technical capacities of Latin American and Caribbean countries to sustain NTAE production and marketing. Meeting strict market demands presents an overarching, sometimes insurmountable, challenge as well.
Current services for NTAEs are largely dependent on foreign aid, but this support is being cut back. Moreover, even though some market studies suggest that Northern demand for NTAEs will increase, the market may not expand enough to absorb the growing supply.[31] Since many of these products are “trendy” luxury foods susceptible to instabilities, economic recession in the North, as well as changes in consumers’ tastes, can reduce the demand and thus curtail market opportunities. Given these uncertainties, some analysts predict that the present fervor surrounding NTAEs will soon fade.
Last, but certainly not least, one of the crucial issues noted by several analysts and numerous farmers is that nontraditional agro-export growth and the associated land-use change reduce food availability locally and therefore can hinder food security, both at local and national levels. In nearly all countries, fiscal policy changes to stimulate NTAE growth have entailed reductions of funding for local food production. Likewise, analysts have noted that the increasing investments by aid organizations in export-directed development have come at the expense of attention to domestic food needs.
When taking into account the “bitter” aspects––the social and environmental costs––one is forced to reassess the supposed “success” of the nontraditional agro-export development strategy. The expansion of this new sector is repeating deleterious patterns and risks characteristic of past agro-export booms. Meanwhile, local food production in Latin America stagnates, and hunger and insecurity among the majority of the region’s rural people continue to grow.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Lori Ann Thrupp is director of sustainable agriculture at the World Resources Institute’s Center for International Development and Environment.
NOTES 1. Secretaría de Integración Económica Centro Americana (SIECA), VIII Compendio Estadístico para Centroamerica, 1978, cited in Tom Barry, Roots of Rebellion: Land and Hunger in Central America (Boston: South End Press, 1987), p. 8. This data is based on estimates from the 1970s, because updated censuses have not been undertaken throughout the region. The land-distribution patterns, however, have remained similar in recent years. 2. Shawki Barghousi et al., “Trends in Agricultural Diversification,” World Bank Technical Paper No. 180 (Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1993). 3. U.S. AID data (unpublished), cited in Margaret Lycette, “Women Poverty and the Role of U.S.AID,” Poverty Focus, Bulletin, No. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Overseas Development Council, 1994), p. 5. 4. Martin Raine, “Strategy for the Promotion of Nontraditional Agricultural Exports,” Internal Discussion Paper, Latin America and Caribbean Region (Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1989), p. 15. 5. S. Jaffee, Exporting High-Value Food Commodities: Success Stories from Developing Countries, World Bank Discussion Papers, No 198 (Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 1993), p. 38; and William Friedland, “The Global Fresh Fruit and Vegetable System: An Industrial Organization Analysis,” in Philip McMichael, ed., The Global Restructuring of Agrofood Systems (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1994). 6. Luis Llambi, “Latin American Nontraditional Exports,” in Philip McMichael, ed., The Global Restructuring of Agrofood Systems, p. 195. 7. U.S. International Trade Commission, Report on the Impact of the Caribbean Economic Recovery Act on U. S. Industry Consumers, Seventh Report of 1991, U.S. ITC publication 2553, Washington, D.C., September, 1992. 8. Michael Carter, Bradford Barham, Dina Mesbah, and Denise Stanley, “Agroexports and the Rural Resource Poor in Latin America: Policy Options for Achieving Broadly-Based Growth,” draft paper (Madison, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin, Land Tenure Center, 1993), p. 5. 9. PROEXAG data cited in Marteen Immink et al., Nontraditional Export Crops Among Smallholder Farmers and Production, Incomes, Nutrition, and Quality of Life Effects (Washington, D.C.: International Food Policy Research Institute, 1993), p. 42. 10. S. Jaffee, Exporting High-Value Food Commodities, p. 1. 11. Joseph Collins, “Nontraditional Agroexports, Basic Food Crops, and Small Farmers in Central America,” unpublished paper (Arlington, Va.: Interamerican Foundation, 1992), p. 7. 12. Joselph Collins, Nontraditional Agroexports. 13. William Waters, “Rosas y Claveles: Reestructuraciones de Ia agricultura ecuatoriana y el sector de productos notradicionales,” presented in Argentina at the Third Latin American Congress of Rural Sociology, 1990. 14. James Fox et al., “Agribusiness Assessment: The Case of Guatemala,” draft paper (Washington, D.C.: U.S.AID, 1994), p. 30. 15. Kevin Healy, Interamerican Foundation, personal communication, May, 1994. 16. Michael Conroy, “Problemas y alternativas económicas a las EANT,” in World Resources Institute/INCAP, Memorias del taller “Sostenibilidad de la producción agrícola notradicional de exportación por pequeños productores en Guatemala,” in Antigua, Guatemala, September 20-22, 1993. 17. James Fox et al., “Agribusiness Assessment: The Case of Guatemala,” p. 30. 18. Jurgen Weller, “Las exportaciones agrícolas notradicionales y sus efectos en el empleo y los ingresos,” in Jurgen Weller, ed., Promesa o Espejismo? (Panama: PREALC, 1992), p. 142. 19. Amalia Alberti, “Impact of Participation in Nontraditional Agricultural Export Production on the Employment, Income, and Quality of Life of Women in Guatemala, Honduras, and Costa Rica,” unpublished report (Guatemala City: ROCAP/U.S.AID 1991), p. 32. 20. The impacts of NTAEs on women have been analyzed in comprehensive surveys. See, for example, Lucía Salamea, A. Mauro, M. Alameida and M. Yepez, Rol e Impacto en Mujeres Trabajadoras en Cultivos Notradicionales para la Exportación en Ecuador (Quito: CEPLAES, 1993); and Rae Blumberg, “Gender and Ecuador’s New Export Sectors,” draft paper (Washington, D C.: GENESYS Project, Report for U.S.AID, 1992). 21. PROEXANT 1993 Annual Report, unpublished report (Quito: Programa para Exportaciones Agrícolas Notradicionales, 1993). 22. Lucía Salamea et al.,Rol e Impacto en Mujeres Trabajadoras, p.24. 23. Wayne Williams, personal communication, 1993; and discussions with smallholders in workshops as part of author’s field studies, 1993. 24. Ecuadorian flower prnducer, anonymous, June, 1992, quoted by Brian Riley, Appropriate Technology, Inc. 25. World Resources Institute analysis of U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) unpublished detention data, 1983-1994. 26. Douglas Murry and Polly Hoppin, “Recurring Contradictions in Agrarian Development: Pesticide Problems in Caribbean Basin Nontraditional Agriculture,” World Development, Vol. 20, No. 4 (1992), p. 603. 27. Calculation of World Resources Institute, based on analysis of FDA primary data. 28. See, for example, Lori Ann Thrupp, “Entrapment and Escape from Fruitless Insecticide Use: Lessons from the Banana Sector in Costa Rica, “ International Journal of Environmental Studies No. 36 (1990), pp. 173-189; and D. Bull, A Growing Problem: Pesticides and the Third World Poor (Oxford, U.K.: Oxfam Books, 1982). 29. World Health Organization, Public Health Impact of Pesticides Used in Agriculture (Geneva: WHO, 1990). 30. PROEXANT/University of San Francisco at Quito (USFQ), unpublished results of 1992 survey of NTAE producers. See also Jorge Rodríguez in William Waters, ed., Desafíos de Los Cultivos Notradicionales en Ecuador (Quito: USFQ, 1992). 31. See, for example, N. Bonis, “The Nontraditional agricultural production strategy in CentraI America,” 1990 Master’s thesis, University of Texas, Austin.
