Reviewing Agricultural Trade Policies
To Promote Intra-OIC Agricultural Trade
7
The report is prepared for the 13th meeting of the Agriculture Working Group of COMCEC as a
complementary to the analytical report on agricultural trade networks prepared for the
previous meeting of the Group. These two reports differ substantially but are highly
complementary to each other. The previous report mainly focuses on the identification of
existing trade networks in agricultural products by building upon detailed trade flow data and
using the tools of network analysis; it has only a peripheral interest in the stance of agricultural
trade policies in the OICmember countries. The present report, however, focuses on agricultural
trade policies covering tariff measures, NTMs and trade agreements and studies agricultural
trade flows in detail to identify top product divisions and top products since these are to guide
the analysis of agricultural trade policymeasures in the OIC. Most importantly, this report differs
crucially from the previous report on agricultural trade networks since it identifies product
divisions and products and explicit exporter-importer country matches that carry the greatest
potential to promote intra-OIC agricultural trade.
The review and analysis presented in this report also include the results originating from an
online survey that has targeted the stakeholders in the OIC countries who work at trade and
agriculture ministries, other relevant government units, academia, private sector, and NGOs.
While the total number of participants and the number of different countries these participants
represent remain lower than initially expected, the survey results are still informative especially
with regards to (i) the main challenges faced in agricultural trade, (ii) the roles of SOEs,
cooperatives, and marketing boards, and (ii) existing and expected agricultural trade networks
of the OIC member countries.
To complement (i) the analysis that identifies the potential product divisions/products and
matched country pairs and (ii) the survey results, six country cases were selected for further
study to put forwards similar characteristics of agricultural trade policies pursued by different
members: Three representative countries are chosen to exemplify policies in different country
groups within the OIC (the Gambia from the African group, Morocco from the Arab group, and
Turkey from the Asian group). These three countries have been visited and key informants in
each of these countries have been interviewed in order to obtain critical information regarding
the conduct of agricultural trade policies, reforms and policy actions that affect production and
the supply chains, and the prospects for increasing volumes of intra-OIC trade in agricultural
products. For comparison and benchmarking purposes with regard to being an African member
country that has food security problems, Chad has been selected as the other OIC member
country to be studied via a desk study. Finally, two non-OIC countries (Brazil and Thailand) that
stand out as two best practice countries in the context of agricultural trade.
The remainder of this report is organized as follows: In Chapter 1, the conceptual framework,
agricultural trade policy terminologies, data sources and limitations, and the utilized
methodologies are introduced. This is a foundational chapter in which the roadmap for the
following review and analysis in Chapters 2, 3 and 4 is framed. In Chapter 2, the attention is
focused on the main patterns of global agricultural trade flows and policies. In this chapter,
agricultural trade flows and policies in several economic and cooperation unions across the
world are taken into consideration vis-a-vis the main patterns observed in the OIC. The review
and analysis presented in Chapter 3 are focused on 57member countries of the OIC. The analysis
is pursed at the product division level in this chapter; first summarized is the main patterns of
agricultural trade flows, followed by the analysis of agricultural trade policy with a particular
focus on potential country-product group matches that would contribute to higher volumes of
intra-OIC agricultural trade. Chapter 4 is then devoted to the review and analysis of agricultural
trade policies for selected case study countries. The review and analysis are based partially on
the field visits to three OIC countries, i.e., Gambia, Morocco and Turkey, and partially on