Commodity futures markets in LDCs: a review and prospects

Recent moves by the World Bank to devise market-based approaches for dealing with commodity price risk provide a fresh impetus for research in the area of commodity futures markets as a policy option. Since the collapse of the International Commodity Agreements there has been little progress in finding a solution to the perennial problem of price risk arising from price volatility. This paper aims to provide a background to the more general issue of development and growth in less developed countries (LDCs) by examining past and current policy attempts to reduce the effects of price volatility in primary commodity markets.