The Pricing and Distribution of Yellow Maize Food Aid in Mozambique: An Analysis of Alternatives

The emphasis of this paper is on commercial food aid; emergency aid is dealt with as it affects food markets. It speaks to the objectives of food aid in Mozambique, including the implications of the ending of the war for those objectives and the means by which they are pursued. It reviews Mozambique's experience to date with food aid, chronicling the break-down of the NSA, the emergence of informal markets, and the situation as of mid 1993. It presents conceptual and empirical views of the effects of food aid on retail and producer prices. Both abstract economic theory and detailed knowledge of market conditions in Mozambique are used to draw conclusions about how food aid might affect prices at each level. Based in part on this analysis, the paper presents a detailed discussion of alternative approaches to the programming, pricing, and distribution of food aid, including both commercial and emergency