Cocoa futures prices last week sank to a 25-year low in New York while white sugar prices are drifting down to historic lows in London. Although coffee prices have rallied, a resumption of rains in Brazil could send the market tumbling again.

In the past, international commodity pacts tried to cushion farmers from wild price swings. But the last pact with economic powers -- rubber -- folded in October after prices fell to 30-year lows.

The World Bank, which recently proposed a crop price insurance scheme, last week brought together aid donors and, international commodity agencies in London to discuss ways of getting the scheme off the ground.

``It's one approach that would allow farmers to lock in their price before harvesting and wouldn't distort markets,'' said an official from the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation which attended the meeting. Private aid donors however were sceptical about whether the sophisticated World Bank scheme could be ``sold'' to often illiterate farmers and how it would be financed.

``So far we've heard very little about it or how it will be funded,'' said one British development economist. Farmers in the Ivory Coast, the world's largest cocoa producer and exporter, last weekend burned 20,000 tonnes of cocoa beans in protest against low prices, sending a signal to markets and this week's gathering of ministers at the World Trade Organisation talks in Seattle.

Farmers' leaders are also planning to stockpile 1,50,000 tonnes of cocoa until prices recover to 800 pounds a tonne for December delivery, from just under 600 pounds on Tuesday. ``If we burn and the market doesn't show any reaction, we'll go on burning,'' secretary of the Collective of Ivorian Cocoa and Coffee Cooperatives Henri Amouzou told Reuters in the Ivory Coast.

Following World Bank and IMF advice, the Ivorian government liberalised cocoa marketing in August which meant that Ivorian farmers no longer receive a guaranteed price for their crop. Analysts said that it was doubtful whether the Ivorian farmers would sustain their protests or destroy significant tonnages given an expected crop of more than one million tonnes.

``But it could lead to social and political upheavals with wide repercussions,'' said one. Private aid donors, mostly ignorant of the World Bank initiative, stressed the need for developing countries to export value added farm products whose prices were also more stable.

``It's important that they process their agricultural products and export them at higher value,'' said Oxfam senior trade and investment policy adviser, Michael Bailey. For instance tariffs on chocolate or instant coffee should be lowered.

``We don't see chocolate or instant coffee prices going up and down like a yo-yo,'' said Bailey. Aid donors will be pressing the European Union, US and Japan to open their highly protected agricultural markets.

``In Seattle we're looking for broader market access,'' said Bailey noting that value-added exports of textiles, clothing, rubber and leather goods still faced major problems.

These include non-tariff barriers, such as complex rules of origin and sanitary conditions which are sometimes used as protectionist barriers. ``Developing countries still face serious obstacles entering developed country markets,'' Bailey said. The Geneva-based United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimates that $700 billion of developing country export earnings, mainly commodity based, are lost annually because of protected markets. ``That's 14 times annual aid flows,'' Bailey said, adding that trade liberalisation offers a far better deal for poor countries.