Memorandum submitted by the International
Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)[60]
The International Institute for Environment
& Development (IIED) is a non-governmental policy research
institute, working to promote more sustainable and equitable global
development. Set up in 1971, just before the first UN Earth Summit,
we are based in London, and work with an extensive network of
colleagues and collaborators around the world. Our long-standing
partnerships provide us with access to a range of actors, structures
and processes at all levels, from smallholder farmers and big
city slum-dwellers through national governments and regional NGOs,
to global institutions and processes. In alliance with others,
we seek to help shape a future that ends global poverty and delivers
fair and sound management of the world's resources.(www.iied.org)
The Cancún meeting was intended to take
forward the Doha Development round. It generated considerable
anger and disillusionment. It also demonstrated the hypocrisy
underlying the US-EU rhetoric in favour of addressing world poverty,
with two sets of rules clearly apparent. On the rich country front,
there was a total absence of leadership. This vacuum in terms
of foresight and vision needs to be addressed with urgency. The
UK should consider how best to work with like-minded countries
to show a willingness to do business in a way more in keeping
with the idea of a development focused round. The Millennium Development
Goals set out the global consensus on what needs to be achieved
by 2015. Unfortunately, the MDGs establish a rather different
set of objectives to those being pursued through the WTO process,
despite the emphasis on "development" in the Doha round.
If we take the MDGs as the highest level of global commitment,
we should then be seeking how best trade can contribute to these
ambitious goals. There is already a worrying trend towards accepting
that the MDGs will not be met in a significant number of poorer
countries. Rather than provoking outrage, this failure in global
commitment to development appears to be accepted with a shrug
of the shoulders.
One positive outcome of the negotiations has
been the much greater cohesion demonstrated by developing country
groups. There were high levels of energy in the negotiating sessions
amongst the delegates from the G21 and Africa group, and the belief
raised that at last something might happen in a different way.
The adversarial approach taken by the EU and US in relation to
developing country groupings was very counter-productive. The
UK must find the means to establish a better level of trust. The
best way to do this would be agreeing a focus on the agricultural
subsidy and market access issues. The Cancún agenda was
greatly over-loaded. It now requires re-focusing on critical areas
where EU and US negotiators will have to give ground if they are
to win back the confidence of the rest of the world.
SO WHAT
SHOULD BE
THE NEXT
STEPS?
Cotton
The cotton initiative needs to be taken forward.
Cotton provides a central element in the incomes and livelihoods
of millions of farmers and their families in many West African
countries. A special initiative had been developed by four West
African countries—Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali—asking
for cuts in subsidies to cotton farmers in the medium term and
compensation for the collapse in world market prices in the immediate
term. The dismissal of this initiative despite it having been
sponsored by the WTO-DG, provides a powerful emblem of the larger
issues and ways of doing business at Cancún. It demonstrates
clearly the attitude of rich countries towards the priorities
of the developing world. In particular, the Bush administration
in the run-up to a US Presidential election clearly feels they
cannot afford to alienate any possible voters and appear unmoved
by any of the arguments for why their farm subsidies should be
cut. Their attitude has been that West African farmers should
adjust by diversifying into other crops. The smallholder farmers
of West Africa and their governments depend greatly on cotton
to pay their bills and "grow their way out of poverty".
It is outrageous that rich country attitudes should block such
a pathway. The Farm Bill subsidies contravene the WTO rules. Equally,
by any standards of global justice, the West African cotton farmers
constitute a more worthy case than the much fewer and richer cotton
farmers of the southern US. While the issue of EU subsidies to
cotton is of much lesser importance, an early move by the EU to
support the cotton initiative would give a powerful signal to
the developing world.
Policy coherence
We must address policy coherence within the
UK Government as regards trade, development and addressing global
poverty. A curious disparity has emerged between the approaches
of DFID and DTI. Minister Hewitt's statement[61]
regarding the need to transform smallholder farmers into industrial
workers suggests a very different understanding of poverty and
development issues to that of DFID. For DFID, the emphasis is
rightly on the central role that agriculture can play in generating
incomes for farmers to improve their welfare. By contrast, the
DTI would seem to be advocating the establishment of large scale
commercial farms as a means to raise incomes, productivity and
yields. Yet such a positive relationship between output and size
is often not borne out by the evidence. Rather, the promotion
of large farms has been used by governments and interest groups
seeking to justify the grabbing of land from smallholders. The
"large farm-small farm" debate involves a political
choice as to the kind of farming sector desired. There is no inevitable
process which leads inexorably to a given outcome. In the case
of West Africa, for example, large commercial farms have often
been established with strong government backing and preferential
access to land, credit, markets, etc. In most cases, their performance
has been disastrous[62].
By contrast, the enormous increases in food and export crops in
many West African countries has been very largely due to the smallholder
sector, which has shown a remarkable degree of resilience and
capacity to adapt to difficult circumstances.
Sweden's new development policy[63]
aims to review both domestic and external policies for their likely
impact on global development goals. This approach is underpinned
by a core set of values. This approach provides a valuable model
for seeking greater coherence amongst EU member states. The UK
Government should be encouraged to pursue such an approach within
the UK and in pan-European contexts.
Development education
In the medium to longer term, the British public
need to gain a better understanding of global issues, the importance
of building a fairer world and addressing the unacceptable level
of inequality that characterises our world today. Addressing these
inequalities will mean re-negotiating the UK way of life to some
extent. The MDGs provide a very clear set of messages for communicating
some of the priorities around global development and could usefully
offer such a focused programme for development education. A fairer
deal on trade for developing countries will bring structural changes
within EU economies to create space for activities in which poorer
countries can establish a comparative advantage.
October 2003
60 This note is based on IIED's attendance at Cancún,
discussions with our extensive network of partners around the
world, and a range of project activities. Short papers prepared
by IIED for Cancún on trade and agriculture, forestry,
and water are being submitted attached to this note. (Not printed.
Copies placed in the Library.) Back
61
Reported in the UK press, Daily Telegraph, 13 September
2003. Back
62
See Transformations in West African Agriculture, Camilla
Toulmin & Bara Gueye, IIED (2003). A report for the OECD Sahel
and West Africa Club, Paris. (Copy placed in the Library.) Back
63
Shared responsibility: Sweden's policy for global development.
Government Bill 2002-03: 122 Stockholm 15 May 2003. Back
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