6 CHAPTER 1


prices and increased activity and returns to the sector in developing countries (Bouët 2008).


Chapters 4–7 address the potential distributional impact from trade liber- alization in four MENA countries. As described in Chapter 4, Egypt represents an early reformer with relatively low levels of agricultural protection, though it maintains a large system of consumer food subsidies. We simulate the impact of trade liberalization on different types of households using a partial equilibrium analysis that combines household survey data and hypothetical changes in the price of individual agricultural commodities. This analysis allows us to estimate the change in poverty overall, in urban and rural areas, and for specific types of households.


Chapter 5 examines Tunisia, a country that has made significant progress in recent years by opening its borders to trade and foreign investment, though the overall level of agricultural protection remains high. A CGE model of the Tunisian economy is linked to data from 397 representative households, allow- ing estimation of the impact of three variants of domestic trade liberalization and one scenario combining domestic and multilateral trade liberalization. In Chapter 6 we focus on Syria, which has retained many of the policies that characterized the region 20 years ago: fixed producer prices, large-scale public procurement of major crops, and high levels of agricultural protec- tion. The Syrian CGE model incorporates 10 household groups represented by income deciles of the population. Because wheat is the most distorted agricultural market and the most sensitive crop politically, the model is used to simulate a reduction in producer wheat subsidies and consumer bread subsidies of 20 percent, 50 percent, and 100 percent.


Chapter 7 describes the case of Morocco. Although Morocco has negoti- ated a number of trade agreements with the E.U., the United States, and its neighbors in the region, it maintains relatively high levels of protection, particularly on wheat. We use a global trade model to examine the impact of different types of trade liberalization on the returns to different categories of labor, including unskilled agricultural labor.


In the final chapter of the report we summarize the main findings and dis- cuss the implications for policy. In particular, we explore alternative policies and programs that might enhance the positive impact of trade liberalization and alleviate some of its negative effects, with attention to its impact on the poor, particularly the rural poor.


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