[Mb-civic] NYTimes.com Article: Trading on Subsidies

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Trading on Subsidies

July 30, 2004
 


 

Trade negotiators in Geneva are struggling to save the
three-year-old round of talks to lower trade barriers and
make the global economic system more equitable. But a
year-end deadline to make a deal is fast approaching, as is
the American presidential election. The goal, a commitment
by the World Trade Organization to reduce rich nations'
indefensible farm subsidies, has been stymied by farm
lobbies in Brussels, Washington and Tokyo. 

After their disastrous meeting in Cancún last year, W.T.O.
members do seem more willing to take meaningful steps
toward an agreement, rather than allowing narrow farm
interests to imperil the entire system of international
trade rules. One of the more serious threats to the trade
talks are the attempts by France to undermine Europe's own
negotiator, Pascal Lamy, who has gone further than Paris
would have liked toward acknowledging that there must be
changes in the European Union's farm subsidies, which are
even more lavish than the American subsidies and more
hurtful to the developing world. The union is offering to
abandon its direct export subsidies, which allow its
farmers to dump crops on world markets below cost, and it
has softened earlier demands that this step be tied to
concessions by developing nations. 

There are plenty of other threats, including Washington's
reluctance to make substantial concessions on its cotton
payments (recently held to be illegal by a W.T.O. panel)
before an overall deal is struck. Meanwhile, other rich
nations are eager to undermine whatever advantages poorer
nations would gain from a lowering of barriers and
subsidies - by exempting "sensitive'' products, as Japan is
trying to do with rice. It's far too late to be playing
these games. And in fairness, some of the larger developing
nations, like Brazil and India, which have gained political
clout through the farm subsidy issue, also have to be ready
to cut a deal, even if it means losing some of that power. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/30/opinion/30fri2.html?ex=1092209026&ei=1&en=0da4e4f54e7f5ca1


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