Export Agriculture and the Crisis in Central America

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ISBN: 9780807841549 | 0807841544
Cover: Paperback
Copyright: 5/1/1986

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Before social unrest shook the region in the 1970s, Central America experienced more than a decade of rapid export growth by adding cotton and beef to the traditional coffee and bananas. Williams shows how the rapid growth contributed to the present social and political crisis, examines the causes of the export boom and who benefited from it, and shows the impact of the boom on land use, the ecology, and the conditions of life in the rural areas.

Acknowledgments	p. xiii
List of Abbreviations	p. xv
Introduction	p. 3
Cotton
The Cotton Boom and Its Primary Causes	p. 13
Demand for Cotton by Central American Manufacturing	p. 14
World Demand for Cotton after World War II	p. 16
The Insecticide Revolution	p. 17
Chemical Fertilizers	p. 18
Tractors	p. 18
Modern Technology and Cotton Yields	p. 19
Government Road-building Programs	p. 20
Cotton and Credit	p. 24
Government Promotion of Cotton Finance	p. 25
Summary	p. 27
The Cotton Boom and Its Primary Beneficiaries	p. 28
The Cotton Growers	p. 31
The Cotton Landlords	p. 35
Cotton Gins	p. 37
The Cotton-Export Houses	p. 38
The Suppliers of the Cotton Boom	p. 40
Banks and the Cotton Boom	p. 42
Vegetable-Oil Factories and Textile Mills	p. 43
Cotton and the Cotton Elite	p. 44
Ecological Consequences of Cotton	p. 48
Summary	p. 51
Cotton and the Common Man	p. 52
The Cotton Boom and the Opening of Fresh Cropland	p. 52
Cornfields to Cotton	p. 54
Cotton and Peasant Access to Land	p. 55
Cotton and the Creation of a Wage-Labor Force	p. 60
The Irreversibility of Cotton	p. 66
Cotton to Cattle	p. 67
Cotton to Sugar	p. 67
Cotton to Basic Grains	p. 69
Cotton and the Social Fabric	p. 70
Summary	p. 73
Cattle
The Beef-Export Boom and Its Primary Causes	p. 77
Practices before the Export Boom	p. 78
The Demand for Beef in the U.S. Market	p. 84
The Vital Supply Link: The Modern Packing Plant	p. 87
Refrigerator Transport	p. 90
Roads and the Beef Trade	p. 91
State Promotion of the Beef Business	p. 92
Road Finance	p. 92
Direct Promotional Finance to the Beef Sector	p. 93
The Beef-Export Boom and Technology on the Ranch	p. 95
Summary	p. 98
The Beneficiaries of Beef	p. 99
The Source of the Beef Bonanza	p. 99
The Packing Plants' Share of the Beef Bonanza	p. 102
The Impact of the Boom on Slaughter Sheds, Vendors, and Consumers	p. 105
Private Investment in Cattle Raising	p. 105
The Collapse of the Small Holder	p. 108
Profits from the Sale of Modern Inputs	p. 109
Vertical Integration in the Beef-Export Business	p. 110
Summary	p. 110
Cattle and the Campesino	p. 113
Forest to Pasture	p. 113
Forest to Corn to Pasture	p. 114
Ecological Consequences of Forest-to-Pasture Transformation	p. 115
Impact of Forest-to-Pasture Transformation on Peasants	p. 117
The Cattle Boom and Rights to Land Use	p. 118
The Cattle Boom and Rural Conflict: The Pacific Coastal Plain of Honduras and Costa Rica	p. 124
Olancho, Honduras: The Cattle Boom, the Peasant Movement, and Rancher Violence	p. 126
The Cattle Boom, Rural Guerrillas, and Counterinsurgency in Nicaragua (1967-1972)	p. 129
The First Phase of the Guatemalan Cattle Boom (1960s)	p. 134
The Second Phase of the Guatemalan Cattle Boom (1970s)	p. 139
The Cattle Boom and the Repression of Cooperatives in Quiche and Huehuetenango (mid-1970s)	p. 142
The Cattle Boom, the Massacre at Panzos, and the Guatemalan Civil War	p. 147
Summary	p. 151
The Crisis
Cotton, Cattle, and the Crisis	p. 155
Cotton and the Buildup to Crisis	p. 155
Cattle and the Buildup to Crisis	p. 158
U.S. Policy and the Buildup to Crisis	p. 160
World-System Shocks: Impact on Elites	p. 161
World-System Shocks: Impact on the Poor	p. 163
Summary	p. 165
Governments and the Crisis	p. 166
The Unfolding of the Crisis in Nicaragua	p. 166
The Unfolding of the Crisis in El Salvador	p. 170
The Unfolding of the Crisis in Guatemala	p. 174
Reform and Repression in Honduras: Responses to Shocks	p. 179
Government Responses to the Crisis in Costa Rica	p. 183
Summary	p. 188
Challenge for a New U.S. Policy	p. 190
Statistical Appendix	p. 197
Notes	p. 209
Bibliography	p. 239
Index	p. 249
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

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Export Agriculture and the Crisis in Central America

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