1. The two positions on this question are represented by, on one side, Yachir and Abdoun, who believe that national independence requires self-sufficiency in food production, and on the other, Huddleston et al., and Adams, who take the IMF view that ability to finance food purchases is the more realistic and efficient solution. Faycal Yachir and Rabah Abdoun, ‘Dépendance alimentaire, croissance agricole et équilibre externe en Algerie’, Annuaire de l’Afrique du Nord, 1984 (Aix-en-Provence: CRESM, 1986) pp. 529–42; Barbara Huddleston et al., International Finance for Food Security (Baltimore, Md: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1984);
2. Richard H. Adams, Jr, ‘The Role of Research in Policy Development: The Creation of the IMF Cereal Import Facility’, World Development, 11, 7 (1983).
3. Ghanem El-Khaldi, ‘Reply’ to ‘The Problems of Agricultural Development and Integration in the Arab World’, in Adda Guecioueur (ed.), The Problems of Arab Economic Development and Integration (Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1984) p. 40, quoting The Future of Food in the Arab Countries, vol. 3 (Khartoum: Arab Organization for Agricultural Development, 1979) pp. 2–3.
4. Kubursi starts his essay with the judgement that ‘Arab agriculture in the Arab world is not performing as well as it should or could… An immediate consequence of this poor performance record has been the serious deterioration in the food security position of the Arab World, particularly in the 1970s.’ Atif Kurbursi, ‘Arab Agricultural Productivity: A New Perspective’, in I. Ibrahim (ed.), Arab Resources: The Transformation of a Society (London: Croom Helm, 1983) p. 71.
5. Alan Richards and John Waterbury, A Political Economy of the Middle East (Boulder, Col.: Westview Press, 1990) pp. 139–83.