Review of the performance and impacts of recent stockholding policies

This chapter reviews the literature on the recent performance of stockholding policies that influence prices. The first section provides definitions of the different types of stock, according to their primary purpose, focusing especially on buffer stocks and social safety net stocks. The next section identifies which variables will be used to examine the performance of these two types of stocks and addresses some of the general issues that are known to influence their performance. Then, the effectiveness of buffer stocks and social safety net stocks is reviewed using recent country case experiences. The fourth section describes the distributional and fiscal impacts of these types of stocks, as well as their effect on the private sector and international spillovers. The last section concludes.