Re: ...but where are Africa's rocket scientists and similar technologists -- in the UN and other gatherings seeing how much charity they can collect from the "developed" nations by making them feel guilty.
Huh?! How misinformed you are! Or are you just blinded by your pent-up racism? Africa's "rocket scientists", as you put it, are currently working hard bargaining at the WTO with their fellow European and American lawyers.... Their job is not about squeezing more "charity" out of guilt-tripped white Samaritans but about achieving a fair deal for Africa's food exporters:
SA Has WTO Case, Says Oxfam Report
Business Day (Johannesburg)
December 2, 2005
Posted to the web December 2, 2005
Carli Lourens
Johannesburg
A REPORT released by global development, advocacy and relief organisation Oxfam International yesterday could spur SA into taking legal action against rich countries that subsidise farm products illegally.
Legal experts consulted by Oxfam conclude in the report that several countries, including SA, could bring multiple cases against the European Union (EU) and the US -- and win.
The report showed SA had legal grounds to drag the EU before the World Trade Organisation (WTO) over illegal subsidies for six products, including citrus juice, wine and butter, Hilton Zunckel of trade consultancy Floor Incorporated said yesterday.
SA could also take the US to the world trade body for its illegal subsidisation of maize and sorghum, Zunckel said.
The Oxfam report said that without subsidies last year alone US corn production would have been down 15%, its exports would have disappeared and world prices would have been 7% higher.
"Farmers from the likes of Paraguay, Argentina or SA could have gained an extra $4bn," the report said.
The South African Agricultural Processors Association said yesterday that the Oxfam report provided figures confirming some of the industry's suspicions.
"The report puts figures to broad notions of unfair trade practices to show the effect of subsidies on developing countries," said the association's international trade adviser, Lambert Botha, yesterday.
But Zunckel said SA, which is one of the developing countries lobbying vociferously for the elimination of farm subsidies in rich industialised countries, could have taken action against illegal subsidies some time ago.
A "peace clause" preventing SA and other developing countries' challenging illegal farm subsidies at the WTO expired last year.
"SA has been fast asleep by missing these opportunities to date," said Zunckel in a telephone interview from Geneva, where he is accompanying African cotton negotiators.
"SA is losing revenue with each export cargo," he said.
"Far more modest African traders such as Benin, Chad and Swaziland have dared to venture into WTO dispute settlement, where SA has feared to tread."
The South African Agricultural Processors Association said it would consult with companies affected by subsidies before approaching government to explore an appropriate course of action.
Farm subsidies have been the key stumbling block preventing significant progress by the WTO's 148 members in the Doha round of trade talks aimed at formulating a new pact to liberalise world trade.
Farm subsidies will be the most hotly contested issue at the WTO's sixth ministerial meeting in Hong Kong this month.
Oxfam has warned that the EU and the US must do more to deliver a development deal ahead of a crucial ministerial meeting, otherwise they could end up facing a mountain of litigation because developing countries will be left with little option but to pursue this line of action.
Of the 11 commodities studied by Oxfam, the US and the EU pay out total annual farm subsidies worth $9,3bn and $4,2bn respectively, which help to distort world trade, the organisation said.
Oxfam found that 38 developing countries were suffering from unfair competition as a result.
allafrica.com
Friday, 12 September, 2003, 08:40 GMT 09:40 UK
WTO chief leads cotton review
World Trade Organisation chief Supachai Panitchpakdi is reviewing demands by African cotton producers for an end to subsidies paid to farmers in richer countries.
Mr Panitchpakdi, the WTO's Director General, was asked by the Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Ernesto Derbez to negotiate on the issue which was forced onto the agenda by a coalition of central and west African nations.
Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali say subsidies paid to cotton farmers in more developed countries cost them $250m a year in lost exports, a figure which rises to $1bn when indirect costs are included.
Campaigners argue that the resulting high levels of production mean lower exports and lower world prices for cotton.
That, they say, spells the loss by entire communities across the region of their only means of survival.
African delegates want the deal to be part of a declaration which will form the basis of a new world trade agreement by 2005.
"We are very optimistic right now. We believe that... the big powers will understand us and that the WTO will do everything it can to arrive at a fair solution," Benin Industry and Commerce Minister Fatiou Akplogan told reporters.
As well as the ending of all cotton subsidies from 2004 until 2006, they want financial compensation for the loss in revenue.
'Moral merit'
According to Oxfam, the US pays three times more in subsidies to its 25,000 cotton farmers than its budget for aid to Africa's 500 million people.
The organisation calculates that the cost of producing cotton in the US are three times higher than in Burkina Faso.
But the US argues that its cotton support schemes fall within WTO limits and also points the finger at the EU and China.
[...]
news.bbc.co.uk
The Bitter-Sweet Taste of WTO Sugar Deals
PANOS (London)
December 15, 2005
Posted to the web December 15, 2005
John Kamau
Kenya/Hong Kong
The injustices of Northern sugar subsidies - and the way their reform could damage some developing countries - have been a key focus at Hong Kong. But, John Kamau reports, national policies aimed at helping farmers to cope also have a bearing on the future of the sugar industry.
[...]
Sugar 'Marshall Plan'
President Mwai Kibaki's government has drawn up a 'Marshall Plan' to develop the sugar industry by seeking new markets, developing innovative uses for sugarcane and its byproducts, researching better cane varieties, opening new factories, and developing infrastructure in cane-growing areas.
In an effort to meet COMESA's 2008 deadline the government, in partnership with the private sector, has also opened a US$300 million irrigation system in areas along the country's biggest river, the Tana in eastern Kenya, hoping to meet domestic demand and produce a sugar surplus for export.
Sugar is under the spotlight at the World Trade Organisation's (WTO) sixth ministerial meeting in Hong Kong following a WTO ruling in favour of Brazil, Thailand and Australia judging the European Union's sugar regime unfair and calling for cuts in the prices paid to EU domestic producers, which are higher than world market prices. The month before the Hong Kong summit EU member states agreed a 36 per cent cut.
However, the European cut will have a severe knock-on effect on Kenya, which as a member of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) states, has traditionally benefited from preferential access to the EU market involving guaranteed prices and quotas for specific volumes of sugar.
The move may also sharpen competition between developing countries. ACP countries complain they would receive very little compensation in comparison to that offered to EU producers.
"We fear that as Europe becomes an unattractive market, the countries which export to those markets will flood our country with cheap sugar," says Peter Kegode, the chairperson of the Kenya Sugar Campaign, a lobby group.
Kenya's sugar deficit makes it an attractive market but for Shikwekwe greater competition, even with new varieties of sugar, could mean a collapse of the already weak sugar industry.
"The government must protect us. At least our trade minister, Dr Mukhisa Kituyi, comes from here and he knows our problems," says Shikwekwe. "The changes [in the EU sugar regime and preferences] will make it impossible for us to compete. It is wrong for the government to rush into signing global policies," he says in confused frustration at the consequences of the WTO ruling.
According to Kenya Sugarcane Growers Association (KESGA) chief executive officer, Francis Waswa, the country cannot escape from WTO rules but should find ways of protecting its local industry.
The fate of Shikwekwe's livelihood hangs in the balance.
John Kamau is a senior writer with Kenya's Sunday Standard.
allafrica.com |
