“…The urgent need to expand export production-&dquo;an absolute pri-ority&dquo; according to Irvin (1983: 128)-has led the government to introduce preferential treatment for those producers, including special access to foreign exchange, reductions in the original highly progressive export taxes, and reduced interest rates (Spalding, 1984). These export-oriented policies have been labeled by some as creating a class of &dquo;privileged&dquo; producers (Colburn and DeFranco, 1984).…”