evoke the industrial districts Italy North

TRAVEL TO THE COUNTRY

COTTON

by Erik Orsenna

Fayard, 290 pages, 20 euros.

To observe closely the realities of globalization, Erik Orsenna could choose better land than cotton activity: practised across the world, involving a large diversity of actors from agriculture to the distribution, from industry, finance, research , it represents a case of the "economic war". The author went to see on the spot in Mali, in the United States, to the Brazil in Egypt, in Uzbekistan, in China how to live and work men of cotton. This series of articles, which is a little think about some collections of Albert London, contains little quantitative data, but it is more illuminating than all the figures.

Almost everywhere where they are practiced, culture and the transformation of cotton are traditional, dating back at least to the 19th century and often much farther. They are generally concentrated in certain regions, they shape the way of life and culture. In Mali, dogon country, divinity who taught men the weaving of cotton is a figure of local cosmogony. A Memphis, Tennessee, the Cotton Exchange Building, former cotton Exchange (quotes are now electronic, places in New York or Liverpool), is a kind of temple where are devoutly kept the memories of the pioneers. In Cairo, where the cotton Museum presents 12th century Coptic fabrics...

Rules of the game

Everywhere, this activity prospered until national markets remained relatively protected. Brutally, for over twenty years, the opening of borders has destroyed old balances the emergence of China in the market being the ultimate shock of unprecedented violence. The effects are on the ground. Among the Dogons, continued to grow and sell fiber (more difficult), but downstream activities have disappeared, killed by the invasion of the "fripe" at prices defying all competition. In Egypt, factories closed and most of the major cotton families are ruined some to survive by hiding in high fibre range.

Are we in the normal game of competition and the "comparative advantages" of nations Known though not: cotton is one of the more hot topics of dispute at the World Trade Organization. It is a war, where the very unequal forces collide. Financial strength: with massive subsidies granted to producers in the United States (the National Cotton Council has received more than once the price of the "best US lobby"!), and ruinous for the cotton in poor countries because they depress world prices, that may be Mali, to the financial distress Political structures: in Egypt, "paléosocialiste" ideology blocks the reconstruction of relatively large farms, while the size is more than ever a condition of profitability; Uzbekistan or Mali, the State Organization remains a factor of rigidity and corruption. The technological and organizational capacity: it is impressive to the Brazil, low in Africa and Central Asia. Responsiveness to fluctuations in demand: large farms American and Brazilian are connected virtually in real time on the market; You can almost be said of China, where workshops family, miserable but effective, highly reactive and geographically grouped by specialty, (should read the staggering chapter on Datang, the city of the sock...), evoke the "industrial districts" Italy North. Finally, probably the most decisive weapon is research: in the United States especially, but also to the Brazil, was invented in laboratories, with big genetic modifications, fiber performance continuously diversified and improved. Market power is more only by price but also by the development of new qualifications, and the dominant technology vendor may exercise all of the world's producers.

What highlights well this journey around the globe, is that the consequences of globalization go well beyond the issues of income and employment. They relate to the same values of societies and their relationship to time, imposing a speed of evolution without report with their traditional rhythms. Mutations would be less painful if the rules of the game were clearly stated and respected. But, as says the author, globalization, it is like football except that there was no referee.