Africa: July WTO General Council meeting setback
The recently concluded WTO's General Council's meeting in July is a serious setback for Africa. In putting “ back on track” the Doha Round (a Round that most developing countries were forced to accept under duress soon after the events surrounding September 11), the July outcome now cements and defines the next phase of the negotiations in which developed countries will now enjoy a huge margin of advantage. If Cancun provided some breathing space for the South, the relief has been short-lived as issues of priority for the North, namely safeguarding the iniquitous regime of agriculture subsidies, prying open markets of the South for agricultural exports and for manufactured goods, have been defined in the July framework in a way that assures an outcome at the end of the Doha Round that may be as unjust and unbalanced as the Uruguay Round. What exactly went wrong?
SOURCE: Seantini Bulletin
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July WTO General Council meeting setback for Africa
Chandrakant Patel
The recently concluded WTO's General Council's meeting in July is a serious setback for Africa. In putting “ back on track” the Doha Round (a Round that most developing countries were forced to accept under duress soon after the events surrounding September 11), the July outcome now cements and defines the next phase of the negotiations in which developed countries will now enjoy a huge margin of advantage. If Cancun provided some breathing space for the South, the relief has been short-lived as issues of priority for the North, namely safeguarding the iniquitous regime of agriculture subsidies, prying open markets of the South for agricultural exports and for manufactured goods, have been defined in the July framework in a way that assures an outcome at the end of the Doha Round that may be as unjust and unbalanced as the Uruguay Round. What exactly went wrong?
The opaque WTO process for reaching decisions was clearly a factor. Negotiations at Ministerial levels on agriculture involving five countries/groupings (US, EU, Australia (representing the Cairns Group) India and Brazil (representing the G-20) took place at the US Mission in Geneva. Africa was conspicuous by its complete absence from the informal negotiations and decision-making, either on agriculture or on NAMA, two areas of vital concern for Africa. Complaints about the process came from many NGOs and Governments but none more revealing than the remarks by Swiss Ambassador to the WTO who spoke at a media briefing about the 'catastrophic management' and 'scandalous way to negotiate'.
It was also clear that during the many formal and informal meetings during the General Council meeting in Geneva, the EU and the US brusquely ignored the positions that were adopted by the African Ministers in Rwanda and later by the Group of 90 in Mauritius. At the same time, and perhaps more troublesome, was the general silence of the African Group many developing countries, including of the few Ministers who attended the July meetings. Not only did they fail to safeguard their own stated positions on NAMA, agriculture, special products and trade facilitation but they also appear to have accepted vague promises of further work on special and differential treatment and implementation. Likewise, decision to launch negotiations on trade facilitation appeared to have been entirely predicated on further non-binding promises of technical assistance. Of the 10 paragraphs in Annex D on Trade Facilitation, half are devoted to non-binding exhortations concerning technical assistance and aid.
But the African Ministers themselves had argued that trade facilitation was not an aid or technical assistance issue: in reality it is entirely to facilitate more efficient access to African markets, the cost of which will be borne by Africa's tax payers. Implementation of trade facilitation will now find an active advocate in the PRSPs, ostensibly for poverty alleviation.
The analysis of the agriculture text by Jacques Berthelot and Raghavan clearly brings out the fact that the deliberate ambiguities that have been built into the July text will come back to haunt the South as the negotiations move into technical discussions among smaller and unrepresentative countries led by the US and the EU. Modalities for consideration of matters such as the base year for establishing a cap on subsidies, for calculations of bound AMS and the permitted de minimis levels have all been defined in such a way that only the five involved in the agriculture package will have any understanding of the many informal, between lines, agreements. It is entirely possible that at the end of the current negotiations and the subsequent implementation period (itself subject to serious ambiguities), the absolute levels of support extended by EU and the US for their farmers may exceed the current levels.
The marketing of the July package is such that as its “ownership” now advocated by some Southern Governments will require much greater scrutiny and evaluation by national parliaments and the civil society if we are not to repeat the mistakes of the Uruguay Round. Part of the scrutiny and evaluation must include some strategic thinking about how best to promote Africa's interests, while at the same time maintaining solidarity with like-minded countries of the South. If Africa wishes to influence the outcome, it must insist, at the highest political levels, to be integrally involved in the process.
Chandrakant Patel represents SEATINI in Geneva and is editor of the SEATINI Bulletin.