ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the food crisis in Peru and Ecuador. It examines agricultural policies in the two countries and seeks to understand why these policies were not more successful. The chapter highlights the goals and policies of the current era’s first two democratic administrations, Fernando Belaerry in Peru between 1980 and 1985, and Jaime Roldos, succeeded after his death in 1981 by Osvaldo Hurtado, between 1979 and 1984 in Ecuador. It discusses the agricultural policies of the democratic administrations—Alan Garcia in Peru and Leon Febres Cordero in Ecuador—but more briefly, due to their relatively brief time in power and the inevitable paucity of data on policy outcomes. The chapter offers some recommendations for agricultural policy. Both Ecuador and Peru have returned to democracy, at least by the conventional North American definition of democracy as electoral procedures for the selection of the administration at regular intervals. Food security and food supply per capita have declined slightly in both countries.
