WASHINGTON -- American and European farm groups said they are worried that their negotiators on the Doha Round of agricultural trade talks will give away too much when trade ministers meet in Geneva this week.
The National Farmers Union said July 16 it is concerned that U.S. negotiators will make too many concessions on agriculture at the Doha Round meeting of 30 trade ministers in Geneva the week of July 21 while the leader of the pro-Doha Ag Trade Coalition said the group will take no position on this set of negotiations.
National Farmers Union President Tom Buis wrote President Bush that his members "are concerned with continued reports that the goal of simply achieving a deal is trumping the goal of getting a good deal for American agriculture." Buis said that Farmers Union members "are concerned that the United States' trade negotiators continue to insist on farm policies that de-couple the domestic safety net from production." Buis also said U.S. producers face higher labor, environmental and health and safety standards than their competitors and that Farmers Union cannot support an agreement that does not level the playing field by addressing labor, environmental and health and safety standards.
Thirteen major U.S. farm groups on July 14 wrote President Bush that they are "alarmed" that U.S. negotiations may sacrifice U.S. agriculture to gain access for manufactured goods and services at the Doha Round trade ministers' meeting while the largest farm group in Europe issued a statement urging European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson not to sign any agreement that would make the EU more dependent on imports.
The U.S. groups, which included the major commodity growers and milk producers, noted that in a June 1, 2006, letter to Bush they had they would support proposed cuts in U.S. trade-distorting domestic support for agriculture only if they were matched by equal gains in market access for U.S. farm products in developed and developing countries. But the groups said the current draft World Trade Organization Doha Round draft text would require cuts in U.S. subsidies that would be deeper than the offer the United States made in October 2005 but not require the levels of market access the United States had demanded in October 2005. The groups said they were particularly worried that other countries would be granted loopholes to protect certain products that U.S. producers want to export.
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The letter was signed by sugar, soybean, wheat, barley, cotton, sorghum, peanut, canola, rice and dry pea and lentil grower groups, the National Milk Producers Federation and the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives. The only major grower group not to sign the letter were the corn growers.
Heading in wrong direction?
Meanwhile, Jean-Michel Lemetayer, president of COPA (the Committee of Professional Agricultural Organizations in the European Union) said in a news release July 14, "I find it impossible to understand how Commissioner Mandelson can press for a trade agreement which will make consumers in the E.U. even more dependent on imports for their basic food supplies at a time of a world food crisis."
COPA also issued a declaration refuting several Mandelson statements on the impact of the Doha Round, including one that the agreement would not hurt European agriculture. The European Commission's own studies show that that the agreement under discussion would lead to a loss of 18 million euros per year in agriculture, Lemetayer said. He concluded, "At a time of a food crisis and difficult economic conditions, E.U. citizens do not want grand political statements about the importance of the WTO. They want to know what exactly it means for them. No deal is better than a bad deal, and the deal currently on the table is very bad."
Mandelson and French President Nicholas Sarkozy have been engaged in a war of words over the Doha Round, with Mandelson defending the proposed text and Sarkozy saying he will not agree to any agreement that hurts French agriculture.
Meanwhile, National Corn Refiners Association President Audrae Erickson, who has long headed the AgTrade Coalition, said she would not coordinate any joint position for that group before the Geneva meeting. "I assume at this point that folks are giving their views as individual associations," Erickson said in an e-mail. The statement is an indication of splits within the coalition.
Twelve commodity groups, including all the major commodity producers except corn producers, and the National Council of Farmers Cooperatives wrote Bush July 4 that they had grave concerns that Bush administration negotiators are willing to give up more on domestic subsidies than the United States would get in reductions in tariffs and other barriers for U.S. agricultural exports.
Crawford Falconer, the head of the agriculture talks for the World Trade Organization, released a revised text of the agriculture proposal. WTO Director General Pascal Lamy has said agreement on the modalities or basic outline of the agreement is vital if negotiators are to complete the deal this year.
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Trade analysts say that negotiations over reducing barriers to trade in manufactured goods are in worse shape than the agriculture talks. National Association of Manufacturers President John Engler said July 16 that it thinks "a successful conclusion to the Doha Round is still possible" within the draft manufactured goods text released that Don Stephenson, the chairman of the nonagricultural market access talks, "but it is an uphill and difficult path." Engler added, "The gaps are still huge. While U.S. negotiators have long signaled a willingness to negotiate and to contribute to a significant market-opening result, key players among the rapidly-growing advanced developing countries have not. Too many still hold out for an outcome that would produce virtually no new liberalization."
