During many North-South conferences, those of
UNCTAD in particular, developing countries have been
calling for measures to guarantee prices for the basic
commodities which they mainly supply. To this end, it was
several times decided to create stocks in price which
were preventing the developing countries from following
through their development plans, through lack of reliable
earnings. These proposals for creating stocks have
remained on the drawing board through lack of the very
considerable financing which they would entail.
This is the problem which Charles WARIN has attempted
to solve by bringing in new concepts, as set out in his
posthumous book "A Currency for a New Economic World
Order". He proposes the setting up of a convention of the
interested countries (preferably all countries), to be
followed by the creation of an organized international
commodity trading sector constituted around an
International Commodity Fund able to buy, manage, and
sell the relevant stocks. To this end, the Fund would
issue a new unit of exchange, "Primon" (or prime pound)
not in the first instance for circulation but used to
guarantee the monetary value of the commodities
stockpiled. This unit of exchange, geared to
international trade and usable as a reserve currency,
would have the great advantage of being tied to ne
country, in contrast to the dollar with its inconvenience
(even for the U.S.) of being at one and the same time a
national currency yet also the principal form of
international exchange and reserve currency.
Thus Charles WARIN foresees the financing of stocks of
basic commodities. But his proposals go further, in
attempting to balance the consumption and production of
each commodity. He has worked out a detailed mechanism by
which the difference between import and export price
would prompt new productive investments, the existence of
a stockpile giving time for the resulting extra
production to materialize. In the reverse direction, the
lower import price would tend to show down production.
The arrangement would have to be limited to commodities
that can be stockpiled at a reasonable cost.
The proposals of Charles WARIN thus consist of two
main planks : firstly, the international unit or prime
pound, available for the use of developing producer
countries - whereas I.M.F. finance is limited for these
countries to tiny quotas - and secondly the management of
world stockpiles in order to stabilize world prices and
benefit the development of those countries.
This stabilization of prices depends in fact on the
requisite political qill on the part of the rich
countries. Is there that will one wonders ?
