INTERNATIONAL TRADE AND THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN AGRICULTURE

American farmers have gained substantially from agricultural trade, despite the competition posed for producers of imported commodities. Because of U.S. comparative advantage in most agricultural products, the farm sector would be smaller and farmers would be poorer with reduced trade. Evidence indicates that in the 1990s, each dollar of additional export sales is worth about 40 cents in additional net farm income. Two crucial elements in future export growth are continued productivity gains and further reductions in barriers to agricultural trade around the world. The two are linked in farm income determination, in that elastic demand is important for productivity gains to translate to farm income growth