The food system is not a free market. In this country, we impose reasonably high standards of animal welfare - but we haven't applied the same standards to food we import, so all we're really doing is exporting cruelty from Britain elsewhere, and at the same time undermining our farmers.
Argentina is a marvelous place. Argentines are great bankers of information. They import information; if someone sneezes in Milan or in New York, they clean their faces very fast there.
Developed countries and advanced developing countries must open their markets for products from the developing world, and support in developing their export and import capacity.
Egypt is the largest wheat importer in the world. In some part, this is due to irrigation issues and inhospitable climes. Egypt's dependence on wheat is also partially because for decades it has been cheaper to import wheat, corn, soy and barley from the U.S. than to grow it locally.
Now, I'm a failed political consultant. But sometimes fiction has a way of capturing people's imagination in a way that non-fiction doesn't. Conservatives typically haven't written much fiction - specifically political thrillers - over the years to educate, inspire and mobilize people on issues of great import, but we ought to.
China is not looking for a trade surplus but wants to import more French goods.
I grew up in Chicago, and there was always snow. In Los Angeles there never was, so we would always import snow!
We lived by very complex import and export policies, a very complex industrial licensing regime. Very few people could get licences, which were required right from manufacturing a pin to manufacturing a car, and generally went to people who found favour with the government.
Most of us are going through life without interrogating whether our decision-making processes are fit for purpose. And that's something we need to change - especially when the stakes are high and the decisions are of real import.
Medical tourism can be considered a kind of import: instead of the product coming to the consumer, as it does with cars or sneakers, the consumer is going to the product.