WTO proposes lower tariffs on agricultural products from poor
nations
SWITZERLAND: The World Trade Organisation proposed sharply
lowering tariffs on some agricultural products from poorer countries in
exchange for them reducing trade protection measures.
The WTO's chief agriculture negotiator, Crawford Falconer, said the
new proposal could allow for progress in the stalled Doha round of
negotiations aimed at reducing barriers to global commerce.
Falconer said developed countries should reduce tariffs for tropical
products to zero for tariffs currently situated at less than 25 percent,
while those above that threshold should drop by 85 percent.
He also proposed limiting special safeguard mechanisms used by poorer
countries that allow them to increase tariffs to protect their economies
against abrupt influxes of imports.
"If this is a mechanism which would, when applied, be capable of
being triggered literally hundreds of times in any given year, how is
this to be reconciled with something that is 'special'?" Falconer said.
He proposed making "this instrument workable and responsive to genuine
need."
That position goes against that of the G33, a group of 46 developing
countries with large rural populations, including Indonesia, India,
China and Kenya.
The group has demanded that the safeguard mechanism be applied to all
import products.
Falconer's proposal, however, is in keeping with the position of the
so-called Cairns group of agricultural export countries, including
Australia, Canada and Brazil.
Focus on the Global South, a nongovernmental group, said the proposal
showed "ignorance or gross insensitivity towards the crisis caused by
import surges experienced by a vast number of developing countries."
The organisation cited Cameroon as an example, saying poultry imports
into the African country increased nearly 300 percent between 1999 and
2004, resulting in the loss of 110,000 rural jobs annually between 1994
and 2003.
Geneva, Sunday AFP |