We've always known it, but now it seems Bill Clinton does too

This is a great AP article on how cheap rice imports (and unfettered free trade in general) have undercut Haitian farming. A highlight of the article is Bill Clinton's recognition of this obvious fact, which stands in stark contrast to longstanding US policy on international development aid. This US aid policy follows the US farm lobby's party line, as expressed in the last sentence of the article, "The productivity of U.S. farmers helps feed countries which cannot feed themselves."

This is of course a self-fulfilling (and self-serving, for US farmers) diagnosis; if you undercut a country's local production, it will not be able to feed itself, which means it will rely even more on imports, hence further undercutting local production. I seriously doubt farmers and citizens in the US would consider it a boon if the situation were reversed, and we were flooded by cheap Brazilian grain and soybean imports. We would accurately see it as an affront to our sovereignty, not as a great humanitarian gesture from Brazil.