The case of medicine. It can't always be easy to be Pascal Lamy these days. He is continuing to fight, with generally positive results, for social, environmental and fair trade rules to be accepted for international trade, while at the same time anti-globalisationists want to turn him into the symbol of no-holds-barred globalisation and submission to the WTO (World Trade Organisation). Even the most demagogic and ignorant of his political and party peers are attempting to tarnish his image. A large section of the anti-globalisation movement has understood, in fact, that globalisation is a fact that cannot be denied but has to be channelled and regulated, and their slogans today call for "a different globalisation" without rejecting globalisation itself. But the movement will never admit that this is exactly the objective Pascal Lamy has been fighting for since he took up his job, along with all the European Commission, and most of the media listen to those with the loudest voice. When the agreement on generic medicine was announced at the WTO, I heard nobody point out the extent to which Pascal Lamy's activity had been vital in achieving the agreement, firstly in getting the EU's position heard and then to get the US to accept it. No matter. When the health of tens of millions of people is at stake, one isn't going to hanker after a halo of personal merit. But we could underline that Europe played a role here in line with its traditions and humanitarian ambitions, and Pascal Lamy played an important part.
It is true that even this agreement is criticised because it doesn't solve all the problems of AIDS and this is understandable because it only covers patents. But patents are essential and the EU's mediation was more useful and effective than the agitation of people calling for multinationals to be scrapped, forgetting that it is no accident that one has to turn to multinationals for the medicines in question - in the current state of the world, nobody else is able to manufacture them. Pascal Lamy spoke about a balance struck between the needs of poor countries and the need to preserve the patent system because it is vital for the research and development of new medicines. That is fighting for a suffering humanity, but it is nothing new for us to learn that for some movements, the needs of human beings suffering from AIDS or other endemic diseases (and famine) are less important than the political and ideological aims that encourage them.
Seven further considerations (plus one). Fortunately, for farming, Lamy has Franz Fischler by his side, and together they ensure that the European vision of a multilateral but organised world where free trade is not an end in itself but a means to achieving greater balance and justice is defended as it merits. Everyone should read and consider pages 9 and 10 of Europe of 5 September, setting out the positions the two Commissioners will be defending in Cancun. The new WTO round will be broad and to succeed, agreement will be needed in all areas. In domains like the environment, new rules will not be established in Cancun, but rules that have already been set out, with such difficulty, must be respected. For farming in particular, Franz Fischler has already destroyed some empty theories and clarified areas that one sometimes prefers to leave hazy. He firmly urged Brazil, China and India to come back to earth and not make extreme demands with no chance of being met. The ten basic ingredients for a positive result cited by Fischler set out reasonable and justified objectives and limits to what can be demanded of the EU, in the interest of both the EU and the developing world. I will add some considerations of my own on specific issues.
1. Lamy and Fischler's final thoughts on farming. My first comment is a quotation. Lamy and Fischler published a joint article in Le Figaro of 8 September stating: "With low income countries we share the concern of not opening up agriculture to the tornado of the free market. The risks and uncertainty that involves would act to the detriment of the poorest people. Keeping border protection is not only legitimate, for those who wish to do so, but necessary." They called on the other WTO countries to "abandon the pipe dream that we will sacrifice European agriculture to the success of the rest of the Doha programme." After which, José Bové and various NGOs will keep shouting that Pascal Lamy has sold his soul to the WTO and the unbridled free market.
2. Mexican farmers' painful experience. Investigative journalism on Mexico by reporters ahead of the Cancun Summit confirm that the application of free trade to farming has been a disaster. Mexican farmers are trying to use the temporary interest by the media to voice their distress - the free market in farming, established with the Big Brother to the North, is bankrupting them. Faced with the huge volumes of subsidies and virtually always genetically modified maize imports from the United States, peasants in the Chiapas cannot survive and are abandoning their land to emigrate to the US in the most miserable conditions. This cannot fail to strengthen my opposition to the FTZs, even in agriculture, that the EU was pledging left, right and centre a few years back and my call for any move in this direction in future negotiations to be opposed (whether in bilateral or multilateral negotiations).
3. Against dogma. The EU should continue to cut export subsidies, scrapping them in many cases, because they distort international trade and, within the EU, are of much greater benefit to business and big landowners than to small farmers. It would not, however, be a good idea to scrap export subsidies altogether, if only because some poor importing countries find them beneficial. I can bear witness to moves by countries in Africa which note that these measures help them buy basic food on favourable terms. So no dogma, but the general aim of reducing the subsidies should continue.
4. Coherence. Some NGOs and their representatives are distancing themselves more and more from the demagogy that used to reign (and still does) in their ranks. Thierry Kesteloot of Oxfam has denounced the objective of free trade in agriculture pursued by the WTO, that favours exports, encourages overproduction and smashes prices, leading to the loss of millions of family businesses in the North and the South. He is calling for a well thought-out policy of price support as long as it doesn't affect production elsewhere. José Bové himself said that he was calling for recognition of food sovereignty as a fundamental right. I don't think he lacks coherence to the extent of challenging a right in Europe that he is calling for elsewhere.
5. Call for thought. ACP countries must clearly choose sides. They can't defend the multifunctionality of agriculture for themselves and challenge this for Europe. They cannot call for both the free market, "true prices" for some products and preferential prices for areas where they are not competitive. If they want to join the demands of the Cairns Group for the scrapping of all restrictions on farm trade, they can, but they have to understand that this means scrapping all the "preferences" currently granted for their bananas, sugar (paid at EU prices), rum and other prices. They have to choice.
6. The Cairns Group does not represent developing countries. The Cairns Group is clearly entitled to defend its members' interests but cannot proclaim itself a spokesperson for all developing countries (comment made by Lamy and Fischler in article quoted in point 1). Low income countries are net importers of sugar, cereals, beef and lamb to the tune of EUR 2 billion a year. The richest Cairns Group countries are next exporters to the tune of EUR 17 billion a year. Who would benefit from the full free market in these products?
7. A logical demand. Those opposing the EU's call for geographical denominations of food products to be protects never cease to astonish me. Products like champagne, Parma ham, Bordeaux wines and the like are the outcome of centuries of hard work and carefully respected traditions. Usurping geographical origin labels damages producers and millions upon millions of consumers are conned. Let us leave to one side, if you please, the arguments about poor countries since it is not poor countries that make false champagne or misuse the label "Parma ham", but the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Argentina and the like.
I would add that the case of cotton merits considerable reflection and special treatment because it is a product where Africa is clearly competitive and African producers are seriously damaged by EU subsidies (for 450,000 tonnes of cotton a year) and, more particularly, US subsidies (for 3 million tonnes). A solution has to be found.
(F.R.)