ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the development of trade and production patterns of major agricultural products since the end of the 1980s. The data for analysis seeks to establish the effects of each of the major changes in trading arrangements, was obtained from the FAOSTAT statistical database of the United Nations food and agriculture organisation. The decisive factor for the developments on the world markets for agricultural products was the change in the domestic agricultural policies of the trade superpowers, the European Union and the United States of America. The greatest changes took place in cereals markets where market interventions were reformed most fundamentally, whereas for products for which policies remained fundamentally unchanged world markets remained. The Cairns Group of major agricultural exporters leads and represents the countries wanting to set a very tight framework for the agricultural policies.
