This volume contains the proceedings of the conference on ‘Primary Commodity Prices: Economic Models and Policy’, organized by the Centre for Economic Policy Research and held in London on 16/17 March 1989. It formed part of the Centre's programme in International Trade and was supported by Rio Tinto Zinc pic, the European Investment Bank, the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Overseas Development Administration. We are extremely grateful to our sponsors for both their financial support and their advice and encouragement in drawing up the programme.

We also wish to thank Alasdair Smith and Richard Portes for encouraging us to run the conference, Wendy Thompson for managing the business arrangements, Andreas Köttering for acting as rapporteur and Jacqui Eggo for ensuring that the conference ran smoothly. Paul Compton, the Centre's Publications Officer, guided this volume to press rapidly and efficiently; he and we were pleased to work with John Black of the University of Exeter, who served as Production Editor. They have kept editors, authors and discussants to CEPR's very tight production schedule, so that these timely, policy-relevant analyses by leading researchers would quickly reach a wide audience.

Conferences are cooperative efforts. We trust that our colleagues, sponsors and readers will find the volume as worthwhile as we have. We believe that the research reported here will communicate to readers the latest thinking on commodity price modelling, encourage researchers to explore new and stimulating paths, and inform current policy debates on price and earnings stabilization.