ABSTRACT
In 1967, the multilateral General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) established low import tariffs to Europe on cassava (Manihot esculenta), and named Brazil and Indonesia, then the largest producers of cassava, as the principal exporters. Instead of Indonesia and Brazil emerging as the top exporters to Europe, by 1975, Thailand emerged as the dominant world exporter of cassava chips, pellets, and starches. In 1985 Thailand garnered 95% of the European cassava imports. The unexpected and dramatic emergence of Thailand as a cassava exporter took the European Economic Community (EEC) by surprise and quickly led to attempts to manage the .ood of cassava products to protect competing European grain producers. By the mid-1990s, managed quota access to the European market was dramatically closed to Thai exporters. As the warning signals grew through the late 1980s and early 1990s, leading economic development agencies and pundits heralded dire consequences for Thai cassava growers. Instead, Thai cassava production suffered only a minor setback and Thai exports continue to dominant the world market. How did these two outcomes come about? And, why were they not anticipated by leading policymakers and social scientists?
