The purpose of this book is to analyze the effects of developed countries' agricultural policies on developing countries. The main focus is on food security, poverty and other topics such as multifunctionality, biotechnology and regional agreements, as an input to policy reform within the World Trade Organization (WTO) trade negotiations. The book arises from a joint project between the Food and Resource Economics Institute in Denmark and the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington.

At the 1964 annual meeting of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in Panama, Felipe Herrera, then the President of the institution, argued that Cour institution must continue to demonstrate that, being a bank, it is also more than a bank. What is this institution that had the backing of both Latin American countries and the United States, and that since Herrera many have claimed it is more than a bank? And how did it come into existence?