STOP THE WTO TALKS AND BURY THE DOHA ROUND: More than 70 European NGOs demand a new approach to the multilateral trading system

John Hilary from War on Want said: “The time has come to admit that the current WTO system will not result in a pro-development deal. The Doha round must be scrapped- the current package would be a bad deal, serving exclusively the interests of the biggest corporations around the world. The only chance for a real development agenda is to bury the Doha Round, tear up the text and start anew.”

Peter Hardstaff, Head of Policy at the World Development movement said: “These talks have degenerated into blackmail, with developing countries being threatened with the collapse of the WTO and an expansion of bi-lateral trade deals if they don’t accept the deal on the table. These are myths peddled to force a deal. We believe in multilateral rules for international trade but that does not mean doing a deal at any cost. What is needed is a fundamental shift in European and US trade policy and a fundamental change to the way trade rules are negotiated. Until then, trade talks look set to ignore the needs of developing countries and the environment.”Campaigners are calling on rich nations to completely re-evaluate their trade-policy and they demand that the way trade negotiations are conducted is fundamentally reformed. They also question the legitimacy of the Mini-Ministerial in which the majority of WTO members will not even be represented.

The campaigners dismiss EU and U.S. attempts to cast the Doha Agenda as a multilateral effort to advance development as completely hypocritical. A series of recent economic reports [3] show steadily shrinking gains for developing countries: The World Bank reduced initial projections of $ 500 billion in 2003 to a mere $ 96 billion in 2005, with only $16 billion going to a few developing countries such as Brazil, India and China. The rest of the money is flowing to developed countries. The majority of the population in many developing countries, especially sub-Saharan and other least developed countries, will become even poorer.

Instead of reviewing the Agreement on Agriculture to address food sovereignty, livelihood concerns, and survival needs of hundreds of millions of farmers worldwide, agriculture talks have focused on expanding global markets for exporters and large agribusinesses from developed and some developing countries. In the NAMA negotiations on industrial tariffs and natural resources, the tariff cuts and deregulations proposed by developed countries will have significant and detrimental long-term impacts world wide, especially in developing countries, such as deindustrialisation, loss of jobs and further exploitation of natural resources.

For more information, please contact:

John Hilary, War on Want, jhilary@waronwant.org, +44 20 7549 0555
Mobile: +44 7879 641848

Rosie Walker, War on Want, rwalker@waronwant.org, +44 20 7549 0584
Mobile: +44 7799 465322

Dave Timms, World Development Movement, dave@wdm.org.uk, +44 (0)20 7274 7630
Mobile: +44 (0)7711 875345

Notes:

[1] The Seattle to Brussels Network is a network of European civil society organisations aiming to develop a sustainable, socially and democratically accountable trade system.
www.s2bnetwork.org

[2] The open letter “Multilateral trading System: time for a new approach” was signed by 103 international Organisations and was sent out world wide to ministers. It provides background information to this statement and can be downloaded from www.s2bnetwork.org/s2bnetwork/download/Letter%20to%20Ministers%20June%202006%20English.pdf?id=122

[3] A series of devastating reports on the potential outcomes of the Doha Round were published by the World Bank, the UN, and several think tanks including
“Agricultural Trade Reform and the Doha Development Agenda”, Kym Anderson and Will Martin et. al. World Bank Report, Nov.1, 2005
“Winners and Losers: Impact of the Doha Round on Developing Countries”, Sandra Polaski, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC, 2006
“Global Overview Trade Sustainability Assessment of the Doha Development Agenda” from the EU, final draft report
“The WTO’s Empty Hong Kong Development Package: How the WTO’s 97% Duty Free Proposal could leave poor Countries worse off”, Action Aid International and Public Citizen