Ghanaian farmers struggle to get a foothold in the international market.
Augustine Adongo is the chief executive of the Federation of Associations of Ghanaian Exporters. His job is to help Ghana's manufacturers, particularly the 70% of the population involved in agriculture, gain a bigger share of the international trade market. But "non-tariff" barriers conceived and imposed by the European Union have made that task a difficult one.
The globalization lobby insists that trade is now the best way for impoverished countries to work their way out of poverty: they must open their markets to imported goods, deregulate, ensure openness to foreign entities and practice good 'governance'. Anti-globalization advocates oppose this viewpoint, arguing that trade is simply not working for the poorest of the poor. They say that the rules of trade are rigged in favor of the developed world by subsidies, regulations and penalties intended to marginalize exports from countries like Ghana.
THE TRADE TRAP follows Adongo as he visits farmers and business owners across his country, exploring both sides of the globalization issue along the way.
With the support of the European Commission Directorate General for Development to promote better understanding of development issues; and the Directorate General for the Environment.
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