Tea producers and elections

  In economic literature, there is a concept known as a “budget for elections” or “election economics.” The issue is this: instead of spreading salary increases or raises for any segment of society over time, they are timed to coincide with the pre-election period to maximize the benefit derived from the payment made.

As this practice is seen in almost all capitalist economies, it is clear that it works more powerfully in underdeveloped societies with very narrow horizons. Despite this, such practices are considered reasonable in all societies and are not perceived as election fraud. 

However, because there is no limit to the AKP's election tricks, society is not being deceived just once in exceptional periods, but every single time. The strange word “being deceived” has begun to be normalized in a dangerous way by being instrumentalized in the eyes of both voters and those elected during the recent terms of power. As is known, being deceived once is ordinary and considered reasonable, but it is certain that there is a disorder in a person or society that is deceived for the second and third time. I hope I am thinking wrong! 

Let us come to the tea issue I mentioned in the title. According to those concerned, tea is a delicate product that must be harvested and dried immediately and delivered to the processing center without wasting much time. The producer fell for the AKP's cunning in the last two election periods as well, but this year, when there is no election expectation, both the price given by the state is low and the purchasing capacity of public institutions has been narrowed; in short, the producer has been forced and condemned to the merchant waiting like a wolf.

To tell the truth, I cannot help but say that this result is deserved for such naivety! Some of those complaining about today's abnormal prices are expressing regret today, saying that they voted for the government even in the last election. It is as if the AKP has not been governing the country for 22 years, but appeared before us in the last election and asked for our votes with sorrowful attitudes, and we, without having any information about past practices, voted for the AKP thinking let's try this party too, but it did not turn out as we expected. Dear friends, isn't he the AKP president, the person who, long before the elections, likened democracy to a tram, saying that one gets on where necessary and gets off where necessary! Truly, how can one be deceived after such a clear and honest statement, especially after seeing his skill in imposing his own management system on the nation for over 20 years! Everyone gets the government they deserve, if lessons are not learned! 

Turkey's agricultural policy has been extraordinarily dangerously damaged by two political games, and it continues to be damaged. The first of these is the transition to a policy of commercialization of agriculture by falling for the maneuvers of Western imperialists to collapse our country's agriculture. The commercialization of agriculture is the abandonment of the farmer to the mercy of the merchant and the killing of the country's agriculture against the strong Western agriculture. This process works as follows: The merchant gives the grower a price not according to country conditions, but according to world conditions. The reason for this is that if the domestic production cost remains above the world price level, the merchant chooses to import relatively cheap goods and sell them at a high price in the domestic market to make a high profit. In short, the abandonment of agriculture to the mercy of the merchant, in other words, the imposition of providing production under global efficiency conditions, means that advanced global conditions create pressure on the grower like the sword of Damocles.

Since Western agriculture has switched to industrial agriculture, its productivity is very high. As such, the producer trying to continue production with expensive inputs is defeated against world prices. The reason for this is that, in addition to inefficiency in general production, agriculture, like every sector, is negatively affected by the high exchange rate that occurs due to general economic instability and/or insufficient savings. Naturally, differences in backward mechanization in agriculture also make the country's agriculture disadvantageous against world agriculture. While this is the case, while agriculture should be developed through mechanization and industrial inputs in parallel with all development policies, it is as clear as day that handing over the agricultural sector to merchants working with the conditions of advanced countries that produce at world price and efficiency levels, with opposite policies where subsidies are narrowed and under high exchange rate conditions, is murdering agriculture. The starting date of this policy goes back to the old days, to Özal and even earlier periods.  

The second danger faced by the agricultural sector is the functioning of the agricultural sector differently from other sectors as a result of the inverse interaction of the price-production relationship over time, known in economic literature as the cobweb theorem. Specifically, when a high price is given for a product in one period, the grower perceives this message as an increase in production and increases production, but since demand will not increase at the same rate, the price will fall in the next period. This time, the producer who cuts production faces price increases because demand is not cut at the same rate. This theorem, which works in a closed economy model, does not work in an open economy model, but this time the agricultural sector can be crushed against world prices, as briefly explained above. In countries like Turkey that have not yet fully developed, the state must have a hand in agriculture in order to ensure food security under all conditions. In the early periods of the Republic, the Soil Products Office (TMO) would build silos, buy products from the farmer at a reasonable price, store them, and offer them to the market in a controlled manner so as not to allow excessive price fluctuations. Since this situation kept the merchant away from the agricultural field, naturally, the merchant segments that dominated the state brought the demand/imposition of the state's withdrawal from agriculture to the agenda. Governments that had no plan or program in any field perceived this demand as a demand for modernization, or even for increasing efficiency and production, and reached today's policies and results.

One aspect of agricultural policy is to ensure both food security and a reasonable distribution of the population across the country under optimal conditions in the rural-urban distribution of population and economic activities. A country does not consume concrete, nor does it consume the rent that fills the pockets of politicians. Therefore, agricultural and urbanization policies cannot be left to greedy politicians, nor can they be left to the political preferences of societies that are so devoid of philosophy that they cannot perceive the long-term effects of the trend. I wonder if Plato was right! Not all people in a society can naturally have philosophical foresight. But if the intellectuals of the society do not engage in “it's not enough, but yes” opportunism, that society can make more rational political decisions. Turkey's grave tragedy is that it is struggling in a pit of pitch-black minds that think they are intellectuals and try to give suggestions to society.

Before closing this chapter, I would like to share Japan's vital decision regarding agriculture. The traditional foodstuff of the Japanese, as is known, is rice. When you order in a restaurant, they ask for your preference as 'bread or rice'. In other words, rice is eaten instead of bread in Japan. However, in Japan, which consists of many islands, planting areas, including rice, are scarce. According to the rule of economics, Japan could be more profitable than it is today according to the Ricardo theorem by not planting rice and importing rice with the income it earns from the export of technology-intensive products. But interestingly, Japan has not chosen this. The reason is as follows: if there is a war and food imports are disrupted in some way, the people will die. The Japanese people and their administrators think this way. The Japanese people may not have thought this way, but Japanese intellectuals have pushed the people to think this way. 

So, what did we do? We remember, when the Ford company was building its automobile factory in the most productive potato production area of the Adapazarı region, the leader of the period, Demirel, responded to the rising criticisms with a meaningless and inappropriate expression like, let them come and build it in my bedroom if they want. Aren't we continuing the same atmosphere today? While turning all areas into concrete, do we ever think that concrete neither produces oxygen nor food, but it produces rent and fills the pockets of politicians who do not let the talk of shrouds fall from their tongues when they come to power. When the people vote for these people who prepare their own end and see the result, in exchange for the regret of “I wish my hands had been broken and I hadn't voted,” they receive the response “the horse has passed Üsküdar” as they deserve. Every society without a philosophy only gets what it deserves!