8/8/2019 McLaughlin TNCs and the Global Food System
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CHAPTER 4
TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATIONS
AND THE GLOBAL FOOD SYSTEM
VER THE PAST SEVERAL YEARS IT HAS
become clearer and clearer that the globalfood system strongly
resembles a cartel.
Since the members share power, purpose,
and philosophy, no collusive conspiracy is
needed. Neither national governments,
labor unions, cooperatives and other pro-
ducer groups, nor consumer organizations, individually or
collectively, appear yet to constitute an effective
countervail-
ing power to this combination of corporate agribusiness,
rich individuals, large landowners in both industrialized
and
developing countries, and the financial institutions that
guide and support them. UN figures suggest that the 7,000
TNCs counted in 1970 have increased to about 45,000.
Business magazines agree that the largest 200 dominate
the global economy.
This concentration has exploded in the last decade in
many sectors of the economy: biotechnology, communica-
tions, computers, energy, entertainment, media,
mining,pharmaceuticals, services (including financial),
transporta-
tion, andperhaps less obviouslyfood and agriculture. In
the last decade of the twentieth century, mergers became
one of the most common forms of economic activity.
According to Pat Roy Mooney, of Rural Advancement
Foundation International, Global corporations now control
one-third of the worlds productive assets and three-quarters
of all world trade.1
In the food and agriculture sector thereis now a quasi-oligopoly
with multiple moving parts.
O
