ABSTRACT
It concluded that international commodity arrangements were a suitable device to promote the expansion of world economic growth and recommended that an international organisation should investigate the feasibility of establishing such arrangements and the form that they should take to deal with the functional disorders of international commodity trade. However, an appraisal of those aspects of international policy which have applied directly to trade and commodity issues is essential in order to understand the manner in which international commodity controls evolved in practice. Such an institutional and political framework, in turn, is incomplete without reference to the role played by the emergence of new trading blocs and to the important influence of the US in the formulation of international policy on commodities. The remainder of this chapter will be devoted therefore to constructing a more detailed post-War framework. Some attempt was made in 1970s to encourage diversification and to assess the long-term prospects for primary commodities considered for IBRD lending.
