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Farm-level diversification involves adding income-generating activities at the farm household level, including livestock, local non-farm and off-farm pursuits undertaken by farm people. The objective of this paper is to consider questions arising from an apparent inconsistency. In this respect, policy makers seem to consider farm diversification a major 'economic' issue, thus as an objective, while economists typically neglect it, seeing farm diversification as an outcome from pursuing another objective. This lack of a consensus is further reflected by disagreement over the extent to which national policies should proactively seek to promote diversification of the farm-level output mix in specific directions.

This article examines the relevance and applicability of the law of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GArT) to two specific problems faced by Thailand: the negotiations of a voluntary export restraint agreement on cassava with the European Economic Community and the increased subsidies on rice given by the United States under the Food Security Act of 1985.In the case of cassava, Thailand appears to have had parts of GATT law on its side, but the government was very reluctant to use the law to its own advantage. This reluctance was due to unclear procedures under GATTas to how to make effective use of these legal advantages. On the rice subsidy issue, conversely, the substantive law is unclear and provides limited protection for competing exporters.The wider lesson drawn from the two cases is that GATT's law should be modified and its role reevaluated so that both developed and developing countries can participate more fully in the GATT system. This will be necessary if the GATT'S laws are to become useful instruments in the hands of developing countries in their bilateral negotiations with contracting parties which are the more powerful economically.Agricultural trade has the pride of place in the new round of multilateral trade negotiations (MTN), but in the brave new world that is to come after this latest round, the landscape of international agricultural trade will remain substantially unchanged. No doubt, concessions will be made during the round and some order put into the present chaos of subsidies, but there will still be voluntary export restraints (VERS), and the subsidy rules will still be full of exceptions, or worse, ambiguities. After and even during the upheaval of the MTN, normal life will continue, bilateral deals will be cut and adjustments will be sought by some countries against actions that seriously affect their economic interests.The GATT is seen in this article as the backdrop against which a number of

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