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WTO-CANCUN: Transnationals Urge Flexibility from Rich Nations
By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, Aug 22 (IPS) - An organisation of transnational corporate executives
urged the United States, European Union and Japan to cede to some of the
demands of developing countries - particularly in regards to agriculture
and drugs patents - in order to jump-start the WTO trade liberalisation
talks.
The International Business Council, a group of top executives from major
corporations, outlined its concerns in a statement issued Friday, less than
three weeks ahead the Fifth World Trade Organisation (WTO) Ministerial
Conference, to be held Sep. 10-14 in the Mexican resort city of Cancun.
There, the trade ministers of the WTO's 146 member countries will assess the
state of international trade negotiations of the Doha Round, launched at the
fourth ministerial conference in the Qatar capital in November 2001.
The Doha Round is bogged down in disagreements, in general terms pitting the
developing South against the industrialised North, particularly when it
comes to agricultural trade.
The discrepancies are such that the chairman of the WTO General Council,
Uruguayan negotiator Carlos Pérez del Castillo, could not make good on his
pledge to distribute on Friday the first draft of the declaration that the
trade ministers will discuss in Cancun.
And for the same reason the opening of the sessions of the General Council
itself - slated for Aug. 25-26 - will be postponed at least one day, said
a source close to the negotiations. The Council is to discuss Pérez del
Castillo's draft declaration.
In their statement, the IBC executives referred to these stumbling blocks in
stating that "significant breakthroughs are required on key issues" if the
goals of the Doha Development Agenda are to be met by the agreed deadline,
the end of 2004.
The agenda of the round of negotiations mandated by the ministerial meet in
Qatar focuses on agricultural trade, services, poor countries' access to
low-cost medicines, and other issues that are intended to benefit the
developing South.
The question of access to medications is dealt with at the WTO in the realm
of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights
(TRIPS).
Poor countries facing public health crises related to HIV/AIDS, malaria and
tuberculosis, among other diseases, want the right to produce or purchase
low-cost or generic drugs for their populations. But the big pharmaceutical
firms hold the patents to many of these essential medications.
According to the IBC, the Cancun conference must produce "concrete results
on TRIPS and health for the poorest countries" so that their access to
necessary medications is enhanced.
But the business leaders also voiced the argument of the major
pharmaceutical laboratories, saying that access should be achieved "while
safeguarding incentives that lead to the development of new drugs for
existing and emerging diseases."
The IBC document, presented at an informal press conference Friday in
Geneva, bears the signature of Henry A. McKinnell, chairman and chief
executive officer of the U.S.-based Pfizer Inc., one of the world's top
pharmaceutical firms.
The other signatories were Niall FitzGerald, co-chairman and CEO of the
British-Dutch company Unilever, which produces food, cosmetics and household
cleaning products; Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, vice-chairman and CEO of Nestle,
the world's leading food company; and Josef Ackerman, chairman of Deutsche
Bank, and head of the IBC.
The matter of access to medicine was on the verge of being resolved last
December, when the chairman of the TRIPS council at the WTO, Mexican
negotiator Eduardo Pérez Motta, achieved majority backing for a declaration
that the developing countries found acceptable.
But the U.S. trade delegation, under pressure from the pharmaceutical
industry, blocked the agreement at the WTO, an institution that takes many
of its decisions based on consensus.
Sources involved in the negotiations said Washington is working with drug
companies to draw up a formula that would comply with the Doha mandate,
aimed at facilitating poor countries' ability to handle health crises.
The intention of the United States, according to the sources, is to reach an
accord and present it before the Cancun meeting begins, for fear that if the
issue remains unresolved it will only fuel protests by the civil society
groups that will also be gathering in the Mexican beach city.
The other key issue in the current WTO negotiations is agricultural trade.
In their document the transnational executives took a more progressive
stance than that of the farm trade superpowers: the United States and EU.
The IBC says the ministers in Cancun need to establish "clear and ambitious
frameworks for removing damaging trade barriers in agriculture and
manufacturing."
For agriculture in particularly, they urge the "rapid phasing out of all
trade distorting farm subsidies" in the industrialised world, including
export subsidies.
Estimates by intergovernmental organisations indicate that industrialised
countries together spend more than 300 billion dollars on sustaining
"inefficient" farm production annually.
The business leaders state that the elimination of protectionist measures
"should include export subsidies, which damage farming communities in
developing countries."
"We also call for substantial and progressive cuts in tariffs on
agricultural produce. These should be at least 50 percent, with the highest
tariffs being cut the most," says the IBC document.
The prescriptive element of the statement is the proposal to set aside the
agenda items for the Cancun conference that have not yet produced consensus,
listing four areas that are of greater interest to the industrialised North
than to the developing South.
These are: investment guidelines, competition policy, trade facilitation and
government procurement. "These can be discussed most effectively
post-Cancun."
The four are known as the "Singapore issues" because they have been in
discussion since the second WTO ministerial conference, held in that city in
1996. Most developing countries are wary of the industrialised world's
intentions in establishing modalities to negotiate the four items.
The transnational executives say progress on poor countries' access to
low-cost medicine and on farm trade would give momentum to negotiations that
could be opened after next month's ministerial meet in Cancun.
Success would stimulate "faster and sustained growth in developing
countries, where four out of five of the world's citizens live," they assert
in the text.
With "visionary and generous leadership", especially from the United States,
EU and Japan, these objectives can be attained.
The IBC, made up of more than 100 corporate executives from all industries,
acts as an advisory body to the World Economic Forum, the organisation that
meets annually in the Swiss alpine city of Davos, drawing business leaders,
economists, heads of state, academics and civil society representative to
discuss the state of the world economy and propose means towards social and
economic development.
(END)
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