January 24, 2006
WTO Hong Kong Meeting Analysed by Oxfam
“The final ministerial declaration contained some minor gains on agriculture, such as setting a 2013 end date for export subsidies, and providing developing countries with extra flexibility to protect their small farmers. There was some progress on preventing the abuse of food aid as a disguised form of dumping, but on cotton, the steps agreed fell short even of those required by the cotton panel ruling against the USA.
Developing countries successfully fended off some of the attempts to force open their markets to Northern industrial and service sectors. However, even the toned-down text on non-agricultural market access (NAMA) and services is inimical to development. The offer of duty-free, quota-free market access to the poorest countries contains sufficient loopholes to rob the agreement of almost all value. An ‘aid for trade’ deal was agreed consisting largely of recycled money, and there was no progress on other ‘development issues’.
When talks recommence in early 2006, rich-country negotiators cannot simply turn up and carry on where they left off in Hong Kong. They need to go away, examine their consciences, and make a New Year’s resolution to turn this into a development round for the world’s poor.”
Oxfam Briefing Paper 85: What happened in Hong Kong?, Oxfam Briefing Paper, December 2005 (pdf-document)
January 20, 2006
Thailand- Myanmar/Burma Border
I visited Myanmar (former Burma) twice during my stay in northern Thailand. It wasn’t something I wanted to do, I had to. I needed to extend my visa. Anyway, I’ve written down some of my experienses in Thailand to share it with you. This is how I remember the first Up-North trip.
…Before continuing to Khung Khon, I had to visit Myanmar (former Burma) to renew my visa for another month. The bus ride to the northern border town of Mae Sai took 5 hours. We found Buddhist monks smoking cigarettes while talking in cell phones quite amusing, there are also the ladyboy monks that confuse me abit. Mae Sai has a border town feeling to it. People are going back and forth with things to sell in a big hustle. My border crossing was very undramatic, I was stamped out of Thailand, crossed the border , paid 200 bahts for Myanmar border officials and came back to Thailand. The bridge crossing the border and Mekong river used to be a major entrance point for drugs to the rest of the world. Today it acts as a gap between the rich and the poor, like the borders of US and Mexico or EU and Morocco (maybe not that extreme though). The music that blasting from loud speakers on the Myanmar side, had a soap opera touch in it, making my brief visit to this notoriously militant country absurd. After lunch we hurried back to the bus and sat for another 5 hours returning to Chiang Mai. There was a construction work of a major highway on its way between Mae Sai and Chiang Mai. With China border just some hundred kilometres away from Myanmar border, Thailand hopes that in the future Chiang Mai will become a centre of China-SE Asia trade…
January 9, 2006
China-Africa Trade Increases by 39%
Trade between China and African countries has stepped up since the start of China-Africa Forum in 2000. China has concentrated on buying African oil, but has also invested in Africa. A growing number (15.3 bn dollars) of products are imported from China to Africa.
“…China has scrapped tariffs on 190 kinds of imported goods from 28 of the least developed African countries, and Chinese firms have greatly increased investments in Africa – most notably in the oil sector.”
Today there’s a news about Chinese oil company planning to buy a share of Nigerian oil and gas field for 2 bn dollars.
China-Africa trade jumps by 39% -BBC
CNOOC to buy $2bn stake in Nigerian…-MSNBC
January 4, 2006
Development and Trade
Referring to yesterday’s post about EU providing aid for Africa, I’d like to explore it a bit further. A well known proverb says that “don’t give hungry man a fish, teach him how to fish”. This could be converted into “don’t let poor countries rely on your aid, give them a chance to make their own money”. Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland states it well:
If poor countries could increase their share of world exports by just one percent, they could lift 128 million people out of poverty. In Africa alone, this would generate US$70 billion – more than five times what the continent receives in aid.
As I have understood, the main one of the main problems, or obstacles for development is subsidies. Rich/developed/the North nations pay subsidies for their producers to export their products or just for them to stay in bussiness. This way producers can keep the prizes low and dump the product for example rice to poor countries making it impossible for local farmers to compete thus keeping them poor or even worsening their situation. Edward Gresser gives a good example of this with olive oil:
The olive tree grows all around the Mediterranean, and should bring income and rural employment to Morocco, Tunisia and Lebanon – but it doesn’t. Each year the European Union spends $2.5 billion or so to supplement the incomes of growers in Spain, Italy and Greece. The subsidy, at more than two dollars for every dollar of global olive oil trade, keeps Moroccan and Lebanese oil out of American supermarkets, even as tariffs and quotas limit oil sales to Europe.
President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda has stated:
“By blocking value-added products, our partners in the world kill the following opportunities: ability to earn more foreign currency, employment, enhancing the purchasing power of the population, expanding the tax base for the governments of Africa and the chance to transform African societies from the backward, pre-industrial states – in which they are now – to modern ones by building a middle class and a skilled working class.”
The WTO delegates in Hong Kong last December, were in charge with an agricultural trade reform plan, which was designed to open markets for farmers and in particular to cut the subsidies, tariffs and quotas of the WTO’s wealthy members. They were not able to do this. Export subsidies will continue untill 2013 and after this countries can simply increase the WTO-legal subsidies, domestic subsidies to keep the “bussiness as usual”. Doesn’t sound like free trade that rich nations have been after, does it? Another proverb says: “Don’t talk the talk, if you can’t walk the walk”!
Future plans of rich nations is to pressure developing nations to open their markets in services (finance, telecommunications, distribution, education, postal services, computer and business services etc.). Road side food stalls and small bussiness competing with hypermarkets, right.
Further reading:
Africa Needs Fair Trade, Not Charity
Fate of the Farmers in Balance
QUICK GUIDE: THE DISASTER THAT IS THE HK MINISTERIAL DECLARATION
DECEPTION – EU to Still Provide 55 Billion Euros in Export Supports Even if Export Subsidies are Cut
CANOPY 