Merchants of Grain: The Power and Profits of the Five Giant Companies at the Center of the World's Food Supply

by Dan Morgan

The first and only book to describe the seven secretive families and five far-flung companies that control the world's food supplies. Little has changed their central role since Morgan's best-selling book first appeared in 1979.

Genres: History, Business, Nonfiction, Politics, Economics, Agriculture, Food

424 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

Dan Morgan (1925–2011) was an English science fiction writer and a professional guitarist, mainly active as a writer from the early 1950s through the mid-1970s. In addition to his fiction, he wrote two manuals relating to his musical profession.

Morgan is best known for his Sixth Perception novels, featuring a group of characters possessed of psychic powers; the three Venturer Twelve space operas, co-authored with his colleague John Kippax (a fourth was written by Kippax alone); and the somewhat tongue-in-cheek novel The Richest Corpse in Show Business.

Reviews

[Horus · Rating 4 out of 5]

For those who enjoy journalistic writing, they will find this an excellent read. It is dated, to be sure, and I am now very interested in finding out more updated accounts of the companies and policies touched on in this book. This is well written with excellent detail about subjects who very obviously did not, and maybe still do not want to be main stream news. This would have made great discussion fodder in my university politics classes.

[Fred Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was reading some other books on agriculture and this book was referenced multiple times. Even though it's 40 years old it is still a book worth reading. I was really interested in the grain companies and this is a very good history of how they started and operated up until 1979. The book was precipitated by the large grain deals between the US and Russia in the 70s. I was helping to manage the farm I grew up on during that time and I remember those well. The grain prices went very high. it was good to read the other side of it, the side of the companies. Cargill was never a well-liked company when I was growing up and reading this book I can see why. Farmers were just treated as a producer of grain, just a cog in the machinery. There were definitely a lot of parts of the book I just skimmed as that history of the 70s wasn't that interesting. In the last 40 years Cargill has grown enormously, one of the other companies has gone out of business and the others seem to be doing okay. I see there is a new book written in 2019 by a different author if you want to get updated.

[Czarny Pies · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an excellent but dated book. Obviously an update is desperately needed as the players have changed. Most critically the EEU has added many members since this book was published and greatly increased its own production capacity.

Up until the 1990's the business press produced many outstanding studies of individual industries as the journalists assigned to a given beat built up their knowledge of the companies and markets involved. In the last twenty years, financial market data has been available online which has eliminated the very raison d'etre of financial journalism. Today there are simply no journalists left with the expertise needed to write industry specific studies like this.

[Uģis Balmaks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Grain is the second most important resource in the world (behind oil). The grain trade is controlled by five family-owed companies that are very secretive. This book examines some illustrative episodes of how grain trade is carried out thus giving an idea about how the entire industry works.

I enjoyed the book because it was well researched and gave insight into an industry I knew nothing about. It was definitely worth the read for me. I was surprised by how involved the American and other governments could be.

[Evan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I learned a lot about the history of the grain industry, but the book was rough. Morgan jumps around in the timeline of the 1970's so much that you get motion-sickness. He does a great job (here and there) describing the intrigues behind major deals, but he's often overly self-absorbed and excessively wordy. Were it not so informative, it would get a two-star rating ...

[Vlad · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good reading for those who are interested in the commodity business with historical facts about Cargill, Bunge, LDC, Continental and Andre. You may find notes about many market/government actors who continued operating well after the period covered in the book (by 1979).

[Filipe Coelho · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a professional who works in the agricultural commodity markets, this book kept being referenced to me by some colleagues and people on reddit, so I felt like I had to give it a shot.

Merchants of Grain is the kind of book you don’t really enjoy reading it from start to finish, but when you’re done with the book you are glad you did it.

The content is unique, it’s one of only a few sources of info on the grain markets out there, but it’s not a smooth reading experience at all.

Sometimes there’s too much back and forth, too many names of companies and people being cited, too many irrelevant details, the stories drag on, and you just have to grind through it.

I give it a 4/5 as it is a unique historical piece of the grain markets and the trading companies involved in it, but the reading experience leaves a lot to be desired.

[Daniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

[Recommended for investing geeks and students of power structures. Everyone else can take a pass.]

Certain industries or companies need to be "visible" and in the public eye. See, for example, story stocks like Nvidia, or branded consumer products companies (which require name recognition and habit formation in order to sell product), or any company run by a celebrity CEO. Think of this as one level of vi... [see the rest on my book review site.]

[Joseph Fantozzi · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you want to really understand world politics you’ve got to know something about grain, & this book does a great job of telling the story up to the 80’s!

[William T · Rating 5 out of 5]

Almost ancient history, but an absolutely necessary, and fun, read for the student of commodities.

[Ehsan · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best book that motivate me to take different paradigm, understand business and keep re-innovate the world

[Richard Dinter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Somewhat dated but nonetheless exhaustive (and exhausting) investigation into the control of the food supply by secretive families worldwide

[Alex Gravina · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting book if you find grain trading interesting. The companies it covers are so secretive the book is a little light on detail

[Bahman Bahman · Rating 2 out of 5]

"در پایان جنگ جهانی دوم، ایالات متحده آمریکا در تولید غلات مقام نخست را به دست آورد، بی آنکه آمریکاییان بخواهند برای احراز این مقام کوشش و تلاش خاصی کرده باشند. وزارت کشاورزی و «سازمان مواد غذایی زمان جنگ۲»، که بازرگانی غلات و سهمیه بندی تولید داخلی و توزیع مواد غذایی و غلات را در مدت جنگ زیر کنترل خود داشتند، نیازهای به غلات را در دوران پس از جنگ، بسیار کم برآورد کرده بودند. مسوولان با به خاطر آوردن تولید اضافی پس از جنگ جهانی اول، سیاست دیگری به کار بستند. در آخرین سال های جنگ اول، حکومت آمریکا عملیات «گازاهول۳» را آغاز کردند. هدف این عملیات عبارت بود از به کار بردن غلات به عنوان سوخت در لوکوموتیوها، همچنین دولت تقریبا همه ذخایر گندم خود را به دامداران فروخت. اما جنگ ۱۹۴۵ ۱۹۳۹، تقریبا همه کشاورزی اروپا و آسیا را نابود ساخته بود. زمین های کشاورزی فرانسه، ایتالیا و آلمان خیلی بیشتر از جنگ اول آسیب دیده بودند و در شهرهایی که بر اثر بمباران های پیاپی ویران شده بودند، هزاران نفر گرسنه برای یافتن یک لقمه نان دست نیاز به سوی سربازان دراز می کردند. برای مقابله با این وضع بسیار دشوار، به هوشیاری و کاردانی فوق العاده ای نیاز بود. دولت آمریکا، مقادیری پول و اعتبار در اختیار دولت های اروپایی قرار داد تا آنان بتوانند غذای موردنیاز مردم گرسنه خود را فراهم آورند. ولی تنها این وسیله کافی نبود، بلکه لازم بود آمریکا غلات لازم را برای پاسخ گفتن به این نیازها در روستاهای خود تولید کند. برای به انجام رساندن این منظور، دولت مامورانی به روستاها فرستاد تا میزان تولید را از راه دادن جایزه به روستاییان بالا برد. سرانجام، ایالات متحده توانست با مشکل مقابله کند: در سال های میان ۱۹۴۹ ۱۹۴۵، نیمی از مبادلات جهانی گندم به وسیله این کشور انجام گرفت. کشتی های مملو از غلات، به نام سازمان ملل متحد یا برنامه مارشال، مرتبا به سوی اروپا و آسیا در حرکت بودند و زندگی را برای صدها میلیون نفر مردم چین و ژاپن و آلمان و اوکراین و مجارستان و کره و فیلیپین و غیره قابل تحمل تر ساختند و از بروز قحطی در شهرها و روستاها جلوگیری کردند. تولید مواد غذایی در آمریکا، هم بر قدرت سیاسی این کشور افزود و هم باعث شد در اروپای غربی بی ثباتی اقتصادی پدید نیاید و نفوذ شوروی متوقف گردد. آیا در آن هنگام، از نظر آمریکا پیشرفت کمونیسم، خطری بسیار جدی بود؟ این پرسشی است که مورخان هنوز درباره آن گفت و گو می کنند و به آن پاسخ قطعی نداده اند. ولی در این امر شکی نیست که مواد غذایی آمریکا موجب گردید که غرب با مشکل اروپای شرقی روبه رو نگردد.."

[Jeremiah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was a great introduction to the past century of grain trade. But Morgan lacks a spark in fully illuminating the book. At times it was a bit slow and tiring to read, however it is worth it for the moments of trying to see someone corner the market. In today's world, which is underlain by the effects of the supply and distribution of grain this book with prove invaluable in understanding both history and trends in society.

[Mykyta Kuzmenko · Rating 4 out of 5]

Книга написана довольно давно и описывает основных игроков на мировом рынке зерна с середины 19 века и примерно до 80х годов века двадцатого. Интересный фактологический матерьял и очень живой стиль повествования.

[Christian Del Rosso · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book if you want to understand how grain is sold and bought around the world and the geopolitical side of things