Food Standards, Trade and Development

This paper discusses the impact of increasing standards in food production and trade on the export opportunities of low-income countries and on development in these countries. The increase in food standards is often seen as a threat to poor countries, diminishing their export opportunities and leading to an unequal distribution of the gains from trade, resulting in marginalization of poor farmers. However, many of the arguments are subject to debate and also empirical studies have come to diverse conclusions about the effects of increasing food standards on development. In this paper we give an overview of these arguments and the empirical evidence.