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BRAZIL: Building New Power Blocs in the Developing World
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Oct 7 (IPS) - Bringing about unity between the developing
world's powerhouses to create a multi-polar world is an idea that Brazil has
long been cultivating, but which only now is taking shape, since Brazil,
India and South Africa joined forces in the Group of 22 (G22).
The World Trade Organisation's (WTO) fifth ministerial conference last
month in the Mexican resort of Cancun presented the big opportunity for that
strategy, due to the deadlock between the industrialised North and the
developing South over the question of freeing up trade in agriculture.
The G22, created to fight the industrialised world's farm subsidies and
barriers to agricultural trade, has emerged as a new force that can act as a
counterweight to the dominant powers in the WTO.
If the new bloc had not taken a firm stance in Cancun, what had
previously been agreed by the United States and the European Union (EU)
would merely have been ratified, said Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso
Amorim, G22 spokesman at the conference.
Little progress would have been made on the question of agriculture, and
the global population would have had to wait another 15 to 20 years for new
talks on a critical issue, the diplomat has stated in recent interviews.
That would have amounted to a repeat of what occurred in the previous
multilateral talks, the 1986-1994 Uruguay Round, which culminated in the
creation of the WTO - and the postponement of the freeing up of
agricultural trade, based on an agreement between Washington and the EU.
But the G22 does not look solid, according to international analysts and
even Amorim himself.
However, ''the movement, as a whole, is not merely born of specific
circumstances, and can take on other forms and groupings,'' Theotonio dos
Santos, a professor of international economics at the Fluminense Federal
University in Niteroi, a city near Rio de Janeiro, told IPS.
The important thing is ''to consolidate the central core, a pole of
attraction'' which should be comprised of Brazil, China, India, Russia and
South Africa, he said.
That is in fact the thrust of the foreign policy efforts of the Brazilian
government of leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, which has been
actively seeking new alliances since taking office in January.
''Brazil has expanded its diplomatic radius of action, while also seeking
to diversify its foreign trade,'' said Luiz Alberto Moniz Bandeira, author
of ''Brazil, Argentina and the United States'', a book focusing on the
history of ''conflict and integration in South America'' with respect to
relations with the industrialised powers, especially the United States,
since 1870.
''Two concepts currently drive Brazil's foreign policy: that of South
America, rather than Latin America, and the projection of its interests to
China, India and South Africa, as strategic partners,'' the historian told
IPS.
The G22 swiftly emerged on the eve of the Cancun conference, based on the
Group of Three (G3), which Brazil began to build with India and South Africa
in a meeting between foreign ministers in Brasilia. The three would now like
to draw China and Russia into the strategic alliance.
The creation of new blocs has arisen from the need to adjust to new
circumstances and gain bargaining power. In Cancun, for example, the G22
occupied the space that was traditionally occupied by the Cairns Group,
which is made up of 17 agricultural exporting nations that since the 1980s
have been fighting the subsidies shelled out to farmers in the United States
and the EU.
However, the G22 has not replaced the Cairns Group, but merely represents
''an evolution, because Cairns was unable to respond to the challenge of
Cancun, and the (then-G20) rapidly emerged,'' said Pedro Camargo Neto, an
adviser to the Brazilian Rural Association and a former secretary for
production and marketing in the Agriculture Ministry.
Latin America accounts for 13 of the countries making up the G22:
Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala and
Paraguay - which are also Cairns Group members - as well as Cuba, Ecuador,
Mexico, Peru and Venezuela.
The other members of the bloc are China, Egypt, the Philippines, India,
Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, South Africa and Thailand.
Only five Cairns Group members - Australia, Canada, Malaysia, New
Zealand and Uruguay - have not joined the new bloc.
''Cairns is working closely with the G22,'' and there is no need for the
two blocs to merge, said Camargo Neto.
He also said Brazil's position regarding the multilateral trade talks has
''advanced,'' but not changed, since President Lula, a former trade
unionist, took the helm.
The government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995-2003) took ''strong
action'' on the agriculture front, bringing complaints in the WTO against EU
subsidies for sugar production and U.S. cotton subsidies, he noted.
According to Amorim, the Lula administration's foreign policy presents
''different emphases'' with respect to previous governments, such as its
''determination'' to bring about South American integration, forge ties with
other developing regions, and create a ''trilateral forum'' with India and
South Africa.
Besides meetings with all of South America's leaders, Lula is planning a
visit to Africa in early November, and to the Middle East in December.
But the recognised success of the foreign policy led by Amorim is not
only the result of a greater emphasis on aspects of the traditional approach
taken by Brazilian diplomacy, but of ''different angles,'' Leticia Pinheiro,
a researcher at the Catholic University's Institute of International
Relations in Rio de Janeiro, commented to IPS.
Itamaraty, as the Brazilian Foreign Ministry is known, has maintained its
''pattern of continuity,'' making good use of ''the accumulation of past
experience.'' But, she said, ''it has also changed the way it deals with
issues, adopting a more political vision,'' by contrast to the commercial
focus that was predominant under Cardoso, she said.
That is how it scored ''a political triumph'' in the midst of the failure
of the Cancun conference, which made no headway on the trade talks, said
Pinheiro. In a context in which the economy limits maneuvering room,
political action allows some flexibility, she added.
Blocs that come together around specific issues can change, said
Pinheiro, who pointed out that ''they are not indissoluble, because that
would mean a loss of effectiveness when countries have different
interests.'' But the G22, the product of a ''conjunction of interests,'' has
already demonstrated the effectiveness of joining forces, she underlined. (END/2003)
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