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In this month's New Agriculturist...

As the US and the EU continue to disagree over reductions in farm subsidies and agricultural import tariffs, free trade remains top of the agenda at the latest ministerial meetings of the WTO in Geneva. Some of the barriers to agricultural trade are covered in this edition of New Agriculturist. In Focus on we look at the implications of disease and animal welfare for regional and international trade of livestock and livestock products, whilst our Picture feature highlights trade issues facing Caribbean banana growers. Reaching export standards is an issue for farmers of non-traditional crops in Guatemala, subject of our Country profile, while Points of view presents a variety of opinions on the fairness, or otherwise, of Fairtrade.

The evolution of a more stable H5N1 virus is giving concern as influenza experts gather for an avian flu meeting in Singapore. The spread of the virus is likely to be more difficult to control if the hardier strain proves more resistant to higher temperatures. The potential impact of avian flu on small-scale poultry producers is covered in Focus on, with several other current zoonotic threats reported in News.

Gordon Conway, Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Department for International Development, gives his Perspective on DFID's new research strategy for agriculture. Climate change, he says, will be an important consideration for future research but as author, James Lovelock, points out in his recent book, The revenge of Gaia (see In print), these efforts may be too little too late. Steps to radically reduce human impact on the Earth's resources are proposed both by Lovelock, and by Lester Brown in his revised Plan B, also reviewed. Our own coverage of these issues includes a Developments article on changing land use in Africa and its implications.

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