Two dossiers that didn't get off to a good start. The current divergences between the EU and ACP states (African, Caribbean and Pacific countries) basically arise from imperfect understanding of the other side's views. Both sides are involved in a perilous exercise - the new WTO free trade round and negotiations to sign EPAs (Economic Partnership Agreements) between the EU and various regions of ACP countries. Neither has got off to a good start.
ACP states are suspicious of "regional agreements" because they are oriented towards mutual free trade. Whatever the transition periods and derogations, the aim is for the ACPs to scrap customs duties and other market protection measures to the same extent as the EU. This is the philosophy behind the Cotonou Agreement and the WTO rules authorising free trade zones. But ACP countries are hoping that the rules will be amended in the new round at Geneva (their priority being promoting development) and therefore are naturally hesitant about making formal commitments with regard to the EU straight away.
The EU feels that the ACP countries' common position in the Geneva negotiations is neither clear nor firm enough. A number of ACPs support, more or less openly, the views of the Cairns Group and the US which want the European market to be gradually fully opened up to agricultural products from outside the EU, but Europe rejects this idea.
Priorities to be revised. Ideas need to be revised both at the EU and in ACP states. The EU should amend the orientation of the EPAs and stop asking ACP states to scrap all protection of their economies. ACP should, in their own interest, support European positions on the multifunctionality of agriculture and the genuine priorities of a global agricultural policy and radically distance themselves from demands for complete free trade in agriculture. Commissioner Franz Fischler recently informed ACP diplomats, "any excessive reduction of tariffs for products which you export with preferential tariffs to the EU would cause a commensurate reduction in your preferential margin… such a proposal will benefit developed country exporters, such as Australia or New Zealand, or the most competitive developing countries such as Argentina and Brazil, at the cost of our preferential partners. This is contrary to the basic principle of this negotiating round, which is specifically intended to benefit the developing countries". Fischler welcomed the support of ACPs ("although unfortunately not all) in Geneva for the EU's views, but said the reduction of preferential tariffs was "a natural evolution and one we shall have to face as trade liberalisation continues; but we believe the process should be gradual and progressive".
Outline of a new global agricultural policy. As we see, Franz Fischler's idea remains closely based on traditional WTO rules on scrapping preferential tariffs and reciprocity in free trade zones. But ACPs should be wary of transition periods because they postpone deadlines without changing anything fundamental. When it comes to farming, it is the global rules themselves that have to be changed, prioritising the fundamental objectives of sustainability and environmental protection, combatting world famine and achieving as high a level of food self sufficiency for every community or group of communities. Market access is accessory. The official EU is still far from this idea, although one Member State's agriculture minister (France) recently had the courage to support it (see my column of 11 March) and it is directly mentioned in a recent European Commission document - the most recent issue of "The Courrier", the magazine of ACP-EU development cooperation, whose editor is Koos Richelle, Director General for Development at the Commission and whose Director of Publications is Leonidas Antonakopoulos of the same DG.
Issue 195 of The Courrier includes a dossier by Marcel Mazoyer, Professor at the Paris-Grignon National Agronomical Institute, who writes: "A new, fairer and much more effective system of international agricultural trade is urgently called for, the primary aims of which will be: to establish, on a regional basis,, large agricultural common markets, grouping together countries with similar levels of agricultural productivity (Western and Eastern Europe; North Africa and the Middle East; West and Central Africa; Southern Asia; etc).
b) to protect these regional markets from imports of agricultural surpluses at low prices by varying customs duties and thereby guaranteeing poor farmers from disadvantaged areas stable prices which are high enough for them to earn a decent living and to invest and expand: and c) to negotiate, product by product, international agreements establishing, in an equitable manner, for each product, the export quantity and price accorded to each of these markets, and, where necessary, to each country." These big ideas should be supplemented by support measures for the world's poor farmers - farming reforms guaranteeing access to land for the highest number of poor farmers and food policy based on the targetted distribution of coupons to stimulate local demand for agricultural products (which food aid fails to do). Rich countries should no longer be "drugged" with subsidies for their sales to poor countries and poor countries should not be forced to cut their tariff and non-tariff import restrictions if one wants local production to be profitable. This is how Marcel Mazoyer describes the impact of rich countries' agricultural products on the markets of poor countries: "besides the extreme impoverishment it causes, and the resulting starvation and rural exodus of the destitute peasantry, it reduces agricultural production capacity and increases the food dependency of the "poor farming nations"… It reduces their tax revenue and currency revenue, reducing the victims of rural exodus to unemployment … it means excessive debts and a loss of sovereignty and legitimacy for the governments of these countries, resulting in internal wars and ungovernability."
To quote a few lines of an article by Eyoum Ngagué on a symposium at the ACP Secretariat in Brussels on food security in Africa, published in the same issue of The Courrier: "Prices for agricultural produce must increase if peasant farmers are to have the resources they need to live, countries in the South must protect their agricultural traditions by customs barriers, and the practice must stop of dumping produce for the North, whereby the rich countries offload their agricultural surpluses on the poor countries", "for example, in Senegal, imported rice in return for exported groundnuts". The symposium participants also discussed the negative impact of food aid on local farming and the fact some poor countries use hunger as a political weapon and pointing out that food insecurity is caused by armed conflict, deforestation, bad quality public services and corruption.
Be wary of NGO demagogues. The diagnosis seems to be pretty clear in experts' minds and the same clarity is needed among politicians. But one should be wary of demagogues. Although they are blissfully unaware of it, development NGOs' ideas often confuse generous intentions with clear non-senses. Page 11 of Europe of 26 February, reporting on the reactions of various NGOs to the WTO Harbinson document is proof of this. Our readers know that the document was firmly rejected by the EU and that Pascal Lamy and Franz Fischler have described it as unacceptable. But NGOs react as if the EU was jointly responsible for the document, noting that the agreement on agriculture is still guided by a "you liberalise, we'll subsidise", under pressure from the EU and the US. Sticking the EU in the same bag as the US is dishonest. When Fiona Black accuses the EU of protecting its agricultural market, one should answer loud and clear that Europe will continue to do so for its own good and the good of the world, particularly poor countries. The Common Agricultural Policy has to be reviewed, it is true, but not in the direction demanded by NGOs. Even measures in the right direction should be objectively assessed, for example EU agricultural export subsidies to poor countries. As soon as the idea of scrapping all export subsidies was broached politically (by Jacques Chirac), the prime minister of a country in Africa called for the real situation on the ground to be taken into account - if the EU scraps its export subsidies for cereals, the price of bread will increase in his country and there will be demonstrations. I myself have been contacted by the Brussels representative of an ACP country wanting me to point out that EU export subsidies are sometimes valuable for African countries wanting to import the food they need at the lowest possible price.
Provisional conclusions. Both the EU and ACPs should change aim. The EU should review the objectives of the EPAs, leaving aside the free trade objective by focussing on the term "partnership" since it is urgent and vital to reassure Africa about the option of them protecting their farming indefinitely. ACP countries have to understand it is in their interest in Geneva to espouse EU positions and pay no heed to the siren calls of the completely free market in agriculture which would mean them losing all the current preferential tariffs and therefore their outlets in the EU. Difficult but vital changes on both sides, therefore.
(F.R.)