UNCTAD X HEARS REPRESENTATIVES OF NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS IN CONTINUING GENERAL DEBATE
Press Release
TAD/1916
UNCTAD X HEARS REPRESENTATIVES OF NON-GOVERNMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS IN CONTINUING GENERAL DEBATE
20000217(Received from a UN Information Officer.)
BANGKOK, 17 February -- The Tenth United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD X) heard statements this afternoon from representatives of several non-governmental organizations, as it moved today towards the conclusion of its general debate.
Among the speakers, the representative of the Association of the World Council of Churches observed that while it had been said that mechanisms for widely distributing knowledge could improve lives in many of the worlds poorest communities, other things such as electricity, transport, education and banking systems that reach the poor were needed before they could really benefit from technological mechanisms such as the Internet.
The representative of Oxfam International said that nowhere was the hypocrisy of world trade rules more evident than in agriculture. Industrialized countries paid their farmers $350 billion a year in subsidies; seven times what they spent in development aid. How could farmers earning $200 a year compete with European farmers who each have an annual subsidy of $20,000?
In addition, he continued, the worlds agricultural super-Powers - the European Union and the United States - stringently restricted imports. Meanwhile, the over-production generated by subsidies was dumped on world markets, destroying rural livelihoods in the process
The representative of Focus on the Global South said UNCTADs focus must move away from an overwhelming stress on international trade as the key factor in development. It must pay greater attention to measures that support the strengthening of national economies and internal markets, and asset and income distribution, including land reform.
Statements during the general debate were also made by the representatives of Third World Network, World Association for Small and Medium Enterprises, Consumers International, Catholic Fund for Overseas Development, World Vision International, Action Aid, International Confederation of Free Trade Unions and the International South Group Network.
The Conference will meet again at 9 a.m. tomorrow, 18 February, when it will hear a keynote address from President Abdelaziz Bouteflika of Algeria, before resuming its general debate. Statements Made in Debate
MARTIN KHOR, Third World Network: The prevailing view that financial liberalization and deregulation posed little danger was promoted by rich countries and organizations that wanted access to certain markets in the developing world. This was a misdiagnosis and a financial problem was converted
into a structural recession. We now need to avoid new policies that would further lock in financial liberalization. It is necessary to reform the decision-making system in the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other related institutions. The World Trade Organization (WTO) has developed into a deformed version of the multilateral system that should promote trade. The organization should have the development of developing countries as its main goal. Development should not be left to UNCTAD. After the Ministerial Conference in Seattle and prior to any new round of trade negotiations, the problems raised by developing counties have to be addressed.
JAYANTI DURAI, Consumers International: Consumer policy is about making consumer rights a reality. Its has three components: regulation, empowerment of citizens and representation. These contribute to development by helping in poverty eradication, through attacking exploitation and in improving purchasing power. They help make markets work by balancing the power of corporations. They also promote good governance through consumer participation and by counter- weighting the resources businesses use to influence policy makers and manipulate markets. The current multilateral trading system has allowed the top 10 transnational corporations to increase their share of sales four-fold, while African consumers have lost purchasing power. To help, UNCTAD should provide an analytical framework for promoting consumer rights, producing data to show the impact of trade policies on peoples lives and seeking alternate development models. It should provide a voice for poor consumers and developing countries in the world trading system, through briefing the WTO, assisting in trade policy reviews and developing their own capacities. It should also look specifically at the role of consumer policy in development, by convening an intergovernmental expert group on consumer policy.
CHAKRADHARI AGRAWAL, Secretary-General of the World Association for Small and Medium Enterprises: Small and medium sized enterprises account for 95 per cent of all enterprises and 40 per cent of national exports. In least developed countries (LDCs) they constitute a lifeline. By their nature, they have low capital bases, no wide-ranging marketing networks, minimal technology and inadequate access to trade information. Not enough has been done to equip such enterprises to face the rigours and disciplines of globalized trade and increasing competition. There has been rhetoric, but it has not been matched by action. Furthermore, efforts have been made to introduce extraneous issues into the WTO multilateral agenda which serve as neo-protectionism. Small and medium sized enterprises need committed institutional support from national and international organizations.
SHALMALI GUTTAL, Focus on the Global South: The collapse of the Third WTO Ministerial Meeting in Seattle provides an opportunity for UNCTAD to again play a central role in developing and setting agreements for global trade, finance, investment and development. It is time for the Conference to elaborate a paradigm that subordinates narrow economic gains in favour of social solidarity, political and gender-based justice and ecological integrity. UNCTADs focus must move away from an overwhelming focus on international trade as the key factor in development. It must pay greater attention to measures that support the strengthening of national economies and internal markets, and asset and income distribution, including land reform. The Conference must also give serious consideration to the principal of subsidiarity in production and trade. Thus, whatever can be produced locally with reasonable cost should be produced and traded locally. In this way, the health of both the environment and society will be fostered.
GEORGE GELBER, Catholic Fund for Overseas Development: If the poor are to benefit from globalization, it must engender growth that will eradicate poverty, creating high quality, sustainable livelihoods. Poverty alleviation, or policies envisaging temporary safety nets to tide people over the most difficult period of change, will not be enough. This situation, in the context of the failure of the WTO negotiations in Seattle, is a challenge to governments and to all multilateral institutions and presents UNCTAD, as a development organization concerned directly with trade, with a unique opportunity.
MICHEL BAILEY, Oxfam International: Nowhere is the hypocrisy of world trade rules more evident than in agriculture. The industrialized countries pay their farmers $350 billion a year in subsidies; seven times what they spend in development aid. How can farmers earning $200 a year compete with European farmers who each have an annual subsidy of $20,000? In addition, the worlds agricultural super-Powers - the European Union and the United States - stringently restrict imports. Meanwhile, the over-production generated by subsidies is dumped on world markets, destroying rural livelihoods in the process. Industrial countries should therefore make substantial cuts in tariffs on developing country exports, including textiles, clothing and agricultural products, and reduce the high tariffs on processed agricultural products. Export subsidies for agriculture should also be abandoned, non-tariff barriers reduced and the rules of origin for preferential market access simplified. Finally, the use of anti-dumping legislation for protectionist purposes should be stopped.
KELLY RUSSELL CURRAH, World Vision International: There have been ambitious and varied promises made this past week, but what has been missing are practicalities. How do you attract investment when 15 per cent of your work force will die of AIDS by 2005? It is the enormity of the promises that drives the watching world to the despair outside the WTO Seattle conference. What the public needs and wants is action. Why do rich countries of the world make these promises? UNCTAD should act as auditor to these commitments and targets from governments and international agencies. If agreed development targets from them are not achieved, UNCTAD should examine why and have the power to impose reform. It should also act as a catalyst to united action in the international arena to combat problems that impede development. The impact of the AIDS crisis on trade and investment should be examined, as should the impacts of trade and international agreements on HIV/AIDS. Trade policies should come from the ground up, and be part of a holistic approach to solving individual domestic dilemmas.
CLAIRE MELAMED, Christian Aid, on behalf of the Association of World Council of ChurchesRelated Development Organizations in Europe: It has been said that mechanisms for distributing knowledge more widely have the potential to improve the lives of the poorest communities in the world. We feel that other things such as electricity, transport, education and banking systems that reach the poor are needed before the poor can really benefit from mechanisms such as the World Wide Web. Also, international rule-making so far has led to the restriction, not the liberalization, of knowledge. The agreement on trade- related intellectual property rights has further limited access to information for companies in developing countries. More than 80 per cent of patents taken out in developing countries belong to companies from industrialized countries. For knowledge to reach poor communities, we need a proper balance between the rights of companies that invest in knowledge, the rights of communities over their own resources, and the global need for essential goods such as medicines.
SHEIK TAWIQUE, Action Aid: Action Aid is concerned that poor peoples access to and control over adequate and appropriate food is being seriously endangered by international trade regimes. UNCTAD should focus on global policy challenges facing the fight to eradicate poverty and food insecurity. We support the call for duty- and quota-free access to developed markets for LDCs. Developing countries have reduced domestic agricultural support, but countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) increased theirs by some $168 billion since 1995. It is disheartening that a key food security instrument from the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations -- the Marrakech decision for the Least Developed and Net Food Importing developing countries -- has not yet been implemented. The patenting of life forms endangers the traditional rights of farmers, and UNCTAD should analyse the impact of the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights Agreement on agricultural trade and document alternative community-based systems of biodiversity conservation and management. Finally, the Trade and Development Board should be mandated to establish a consultative process on modalities of civil society involvement in the plan of action.
MOHSEN BEN CHIBANI, International Confederation of Free Trade Unions: Of all the lessons of the past referred to UNCTAD, the most striking is the failure of the Seattle WTO round. This failure is a reflection of increasing imbalances of globalization, the most obvious of which is the absence of links between trade and core labour standards. If the lack of consensus in Seattle leads to a reassessment of the links between trade, development, social issues and the environment, that conference will not have been a failure but the beginning of the search for a more responsive global economy. An international trading system that allows repression, the exploitation of children for profit and growing social injustice as the price for increasing exports cannot be tolerated. The International Confederation of Free Trade Unions fears that inequality, injustice and deteriorating social and environmental standards will only get worse if the world economy is subject to further liberalization of trade and investment under existing WTO rules. UNCTAD should ensure markets operate equitably with a strong social dimension, and strive for the integration of developing countries into the world economy
YASH TANDON, International South Group Network: The first sentence of the Plan of Action under consideration at UNCTAD X is a lie. Contrary to the Draft Plan, there is increasing evidence that corporatist globalization has not resulted in new opportunities for the people of the South but in further marginalization of the poor, further impoverishment of developing countries and further polarization between rich and poor nations and people. In addition, we need to ask where UNCTADs secretariat gets its ideas. They get them from the knowledge of scholars in Western universities, and so the whole programme is couched largely in economistic terms. There is no better evidence than the roundtable of economists organized by the secretariat at UNCTAD X, where 10 out of 11 speakers came from the North, and only one from the South. This is an insult to the intelligence of the South and a mocking irony that those countries that have been largely responsible for the underdevelopment of the South should be asked to produce the knowledge that is supposed to resolve it. They need to understand that knowledge, especially knowledge for liberation, comes not from books -- and certainly not from books written by Oxford and Harvard dons -- but from practical experience of those who are struggling on the ground. The Group of 77 developing countries at UNCTAD and UNCTADs secretariat do not have to sacrifice the truth to the dictates of power and privilege, or compromise their intellectual and moral integrity.
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