Tags:
Journalism of Courage
With protesters being kept at bay, the Fifth Ministerial Conference of Trade Ministers under the World Trade Organisation began at the beach resort of Cancun in Mexico today.
WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi inaugurated the conference by saying the world awaited a strong message in favour of freer trade. Commerce Minister Arun Jaitley will put forward India’s view points later in the day.
‘‘The outlook for the world economy remains uncertain and, despite encouraging recent signs, we are not yet on the road to sustainable recovery,’’ Supachai told the audience.
The Cancun round aims to breathe life into the talks that started in 2001 in Doha, and aims to achieve its goals of free trade by the end of 2004. One major issue that has hogged the limelight in the run up to Cancun is agriculture. India has formed an alliance with 20 other countries forming the G-21 to oppose US and EU’s proposals on freeing up trade in agriculture. These countries, including China, Brazil, Argentina and South Africa, have been demanding cuts in the $300 b subsidies given to farmers in US and EU before the developing countries could talk of any reduction in tariffs for agricultural products.
Developing countries are home to about 51 per cent of the world’s population and 65 per cent of rural population. They will oppose anything that they think could jeopardize the livelihood of their peasants.
The 4,700 delegates in Cancun fear the negotiations will see a repeat of the WTO meeting in Seattle in 1999 that ended in deadlock across the table and rioting in the streets. The WTO is still to get over that debacle.
‘‘We face a choice here in Cancun. Either we continue to strengthen the multilateral trading system and the world economy or we flounder and thus will add to the prevailing uncertainties,’’ Supachai said.
