Foreign trade policies and urban bound migration in developing countries

This study is aimed at examining the causes and providing possible solutions to some of the most persistent problems in developing countries: the problems of food shortage and migration to cities. Most development strategists and politicians in their analyses of these problems point to explanations such as bad weather conditions, mismanagement, and poor agriculture policies. Though these are legitimately important causes of the food shortage and urban overpopulation, the most relevant but less visible cause is simply ignored or neglected in these analyses. We show that the international trade policies of most developing countries in general, and of the African countries in particular, contribute to the shortage of foods and urban-bound migration. Furthermore, trade policies are politically tied to urban migration patterns.; This study examines how protecting domestic manufacturing industries from foreign competition artificially raises the price of domestic manufactured goods. The inflated prices of domestically produced manufactured goods allow firms, which are located primarily in the largest cities, to increase wages of their employees. The higher wage level in cities attracts rural workers. Foreign trade policies that subsidize food imports also keep the domestic farmers' income and output at low levels. We demonstrate in this thesis that because urban interest groups heavily influence the government's foreign trade policies in developing countries food products are in general subsidized when they are imported, while manufactured products benefit from high tariff protection. Such trade policies result in maintaining low prices for foodstuffs even when the domestic production falls in response to migration to cities. Further urban bound migration follows.; This analysis shows that policy prescriptions aimed at boosting food production and at reducing a drain of population to cities in developing countries, if they are to be effective, must take into consideration the political economy prevailing in foreign trade policies.