|
Author |
Date and source |
Quotes |
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Richard Gwyn, The Toronto Star |
3 August 2003 |
One of the most serious problems, which gets drowned out by all the
anti-globalization shouting, is that the wealthy nations keep poor
nations down by subsidies and protectionism. Agriculture is the
worst example. It's been estimated by the World Bank that if
developed countries stopped subsidizing their farmers, African
countries would gain $30 billion in exports and foreign exchange by
2005. |
|
Mark Vaile, Minister for Trade, Australia |
8 April 2003 Dow Jones |
Agriculture should not be seen as a North/South issue. It is
equally critical to all members of the WTO. It is a common
endeavor. It should unite us, not divide us. |
|
Margaret Beckett, Agriculture Secretary, British government |
31 March 2003 The Guardian |
Our economic analysis suggests an improvement in prospects for UK
agriculture. If offers significant evidence to counter the
apocalyptic predictions of those across Europe who claim that the
proposed reforms would damage EU agriculture. |
|
John Audley, Carnegie Endowment |
5 February 2003 |
The United States is not monolithic. Business groups may have to
yield on allowing genetically modified food to be sold and let
consumers decide what they want. |
|
Bernard Cornibert, Managing Director, Windward Isles |
24 November 2002 The Guardian, UK |
There is an obsession with driving prices down. It is reaching
the point when consumers will ask, "Am I getting this too cheaply?
Has somebody had to break his back?" We want a fair price, and a
fair price means fair to everybody, not just the consumer. Cheap
food means cheap food because corners have to be cut. We know we
are less competitive. We pay good wages and good prices to the
growers. |
|
Nicholas Stern, World Bank Chief Economist |
20 November 2002 |
It is hypocritical to preach the advantages of trade and markets and
then erect obstacles in precisely those markets in which developing
countries have a comparative advantage. That hypocrisy does not
go unnoticed in developing countries. The recent Farm Bill in
the United States and the recent agreement in Europe to delay the
reform of the Common Agricultural Policy are deeply damaging. |
|
Franz Fischler, EU Farm Commissioner |
16 July 2002 The Economic Times, India |
The current system to calculate EU import duties for cereals takes US
Commodity Exchange quotations as representative for world cereal
market prices. Lower prices in other regions of the world are
not reflected in this method. This has led to increased imports
at abnormally low duties, and market imbalances in the EU. If
the proposal is accepted by the Council, the Commission will start
negotiations with relevant WTO members to replace the current import
system, which is based on representative prices and linked to the EU
intervention price. |
|
Frederik Segerfeldt, Senior Adviser, Confederation of Swedish
Enterprise |
8 July 2002 |
CAP reform should not be seen as a precondition for enlargement.
But the unification of Europe, with the mid-term review, should be
seen as an opportunity for a thorough reform of a policy that costs as
much as the equivalent of a fifth of Swedish gross domestic product,
to the benefit of just a few. The CAP has outlived itself.
Scrap it! Now! |
| Patrick
Messerlin (Directeur du Groupe d'économie mondiale de
Sciences-Po) |
27
November 2001
Le Monde
|
"
Ainsi, il a été répété à l'infini que l' EUrope s'était
largement ouverte en matière agricole depuis l'Uruguay Round. C'est
faux. Entre 1995 et 2000, les importations européennes de produits
agricoles ont augmenté de moins de 1% par an, et leur part dans les
importations totales européennes a baissé de 25%. Cette stagnation
reflète le maintien de fortes barrières à l'importation : en
1999-2000, la politique agricole européenne (PAC)accorde une
protection équivalente à des droits de douane de 55%-80% dans les
céréales, de 100% dans le beurre, de 250% dans le sucre, soit une
protection moyenne de l'agriculture européenne de 80%, le niveau
atteint dès les années 1980! Pas étonnant dans ces conditions
que, comme le note l'étude récente des chambres d'agriculture de
Normandie, le cycle de l'Uruguay n'ait pas eu d'effet sur
l'agriculture
française." |
| Tanzanian President, Benjamin
Mkapa |
21
November 2001
|
"
The wrong policy on agriculture might lose elections in France, but
it loses lives in Africa." |
| Martin
Wolf |
21
November 2001
Financial Times
|
"
Support to agricultural producers in advanced countries was $245bn
in 2000, five times total development assistance. In the members of
the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development as a
whole, a third of farm income came from government-mandated support
in 2000." |
| National
Farmers Federation (NFF) Trade representative Graham Blight |
15
November 2001
Agence France Presse
|
"
There's no doubt that Australian farmers have lost billions of
dollars as a result of global farm subsidies and, in particular,
export subsidies." |
| European
Union Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural development and Fisheries,
Franz Fischler |
22
October 2001
AGRA Press Hebdo, N. 2830
|
"
Aujourd'hui, 60% des exportations agricoles du Mercosur vers l'UE
sont libres de droit. Après la mise en oeuvre de notre offre, 90%
de ce commerce s'effectuera sans droit, ce qui répresente une
augmentation de 2 milliards de
dollars." |
| The
Evening Standard |
11
October 2001
The Evening Standard
|
""
Which country do you think is the world's biggest exporter of coffee
?" Frederico Cuello, the Dominican Republic's Ambassador to the
WTO, asks rethorically. The answer, he says, is not Brazil or
Colombia, but Germany. The explanation for this is revealing - so
called "tariff escalation". A product exported to, say,
the EU as a commodity such as coffee beans may attract only a low
customs duty or none at all. But once it has been through some
manufacturing process, even just roasting, import duties can soar to
more than 100%. Tariff escalation, he says, is just one example of
the intricate rules governing international trade and which miltate
against economic development in poorer
countries." |
| Tanzanian
President, Benjamin Mkapa |
30
September 2001
Reuters
|
"
Rich countries spend more than $300 billion a year on agricultural
subsidies, an amount roughly equivalent to the entire gross domestic
product of sub-Saharan Africa," he said. He said poor countries
had made more concessions than industrialised nations, but ended up
getting a raw deal for all their efforts. "The price of raw
coffee beans has dropped by about 225 percent in the past 20 years,
while the price of instant coffee in developing countries has jumped
by 200 percent" he said. "As an example, a cup of coffee
at fashionable restaurants in rich countries costs around $2, a
figure almost double the average daily income of a Tanzanian
farmer." |
| New
Zealand Agriculture and Trade Minister, Jim Sutton |
24
September 2001
Dow Jones International News Service
|
"
The time is well overdue to bring agriculture and food fully under
the World Trade Organization so that producers can compete fairly on
the basis of their comparative advantage." |
| New
Zealand Agriculture and Trade Minister, Jim Sutton |
5
September 2001
Dow Jones International News Service
|
"
We all (members of the Cairns Group) want to see an international
system that allows free-flowing trade in agricultural
products." |
| Spokesman
for the EU Trade Commissioner, Anthony Gooch |
3
September 2001
Dow Jones International News Service
|
"We
are commited to increase market access and to decrease export
subsidies in agriculture and domestic support to production
purpose." |
| Spokesman
for the EU Trade Commissioner, Anthony Gooch |
3
September 2001
Dow Jones International News Service
|
"There
is no question and there never has been any questions that
agriculture is on the negotiation paper." |
| The Economist |
1 September 2001
The Economist
|
"
The average annual growth in cereal yields worldwide will fall
by more than a third compared with the rates in 1980s and
1990s. More Trade between rich and poor countries would help,
but not if subsidies and other "trade distortions
persist." |
| Secretário General de Integración
Económica de Centroamerica, Haroldo Rodas |
28 August 2001
El Salvador
|
"Creemos
que unos 500 mil millones de dolares representan los subsidios
agrícolas totales por parte de los países desarrollados.
Solo en la Unión Europea estamos hablando de mil millones
diarios" |
| Indian Prime Minister, A.B. Vajpayee |
21
August 2001
The
Hindu
(quoting
Mr. Vajpayee)
|
"
On agriculture, he pointed out that the Uruguay Round did not
bring about trade liberalisation in this sector to any
appreciable extent. There were no significant reductions in
domestic support or export subsidies by the developed world.
" |
| Tanzanian President, Benjamin
Mkapa |
20 August 2001
Reuters
|
"
When the OECD spends $300 billion a year to subsidise
agriculture in their countries, how can my peasant farmer say
he is operating on a level playing field?" |
| Charlotte
Denny |
13
August 2001
The Guardian |
" The next
time you uncork a bottle of New Zealand sauvignon blanc, raise a
glass to ending agriculture's dependency on fat cheques from the
tax payer. Fifteen years ago, a Labour government in New Zealand
abolished subsidies almost overnight. It was going to be a
disaster, promised the New Zealand Farmers' Union. Thousands of
family farmers would be driven off the land, and agriculture would
collapse. These days farmers' leaders have the grace to admit they
were wrong- it turned out that economists who argue that subsidies
lead to overproduction and inefficiency were right. Some
farmers did go to the wall, but far fewer than predicted. The
majority survived, by changing the way they farmed and
diversifying into new areas such as wine. They cut costs and
became more productive. Total stock numbers fell, but the sheep
that were left got fatter. Growth in agriculture has outpaced
growth in the rest of New Zealand's economy, which has been
anaemic for most of the
1990's." |
| Mario
Vargas Llosa |
8
August 2001
El País
|
"
Nada ayudaría más a los países pobres a salir de la pobreza,
por ejemplo - los ayudaría mucho más que la condonación de la
deuda- que los países occidentales les abrieran las fronteras
para sus productos agrícolas, medida que resisten a tomar por
culpa de los productores nacionales que, gracias a aranceles y
subsidios, mantienen una agricultura y industria agrícolas sobre protegidas que le cuestan un ojo de la cara al cidadan común de
cualquier democracia occidental." |
| Reuters |
24 July 2001
Reuters
|
"
The
49 LDCs say they have 10.5 percent of the planet's population,
but in bad years account for less than 0.4 percent of world
trade. They want rich nations to stop subsidizing their farmers.
They said it was difficult for them to export their
commodities to markets in wealthy nations, saying those states
have yet to implement commitments made during talks in the
1990s." |
| Swedish MP and Chairman of the ELDR (European
Liberal Democrats), Karl-Erik Olsson |
18 July 2001
Reuters
|
"
We must
create a real world market for food products, including
products from developing countries. By getting rid of export
subsidies we would help the poorest countries get out of the
poverty trap." |
| United
Kingdom Secretary
of State for International Development,
Claire Short |
December
2000
Paper: "Eliminating World Poverty: Making Globalization
Work for the Poor" |
" There are substantial inequities in the existing international
trading system. […] Despite progress over the last 50 years,
developed countries maintain significant tariff and non-tariff
barriers against the exports of developing countries […which…]
are most damaging in areas of key importance[…], such as
agriculture, textile and clothing, while the use and threat of
'trade defence' instruments (e.g. anti-dumping) creates further
obstacles". |
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