| 24/11/2005
- Brussels, Belgium – The final sugar deal agreed today
by European Union Agriculture Ministers is the worst possible
result for developing countries and the environment, according
to WWF and Oxfam. It will destroy industries and livelihoods,
will not guarantee an end to dumping, and is a betrayal
of promises to give the poorest countries unlimited access
to Europe’s markets. Millions of poor farmers and the environment
will suffer as a result of the harsh reform unless a comprehensive
compensation package can be agreed before the end of the
year, the organisations warned. “Developing
countries have been sacrificed in order for Europe to
reach a deal,” said Luis Morago, Head of Oxfam International
in Brussels. “The Commission has hurled money at its Member
States to convince them to sign up but has abandoned some
of the world’s poorest countries to destitution. In a
year that was meant to focus on Africa and just days before
the WTO Ministerial in Hong Kong, this is a particularly
bitter blow especially when the EU is apparently pushing
a pro-developent deal. At the very least, ministers must
agree on adequate long-term compensation to ameliorate
the effects of this harsh reform at their Heads of State
meeting next month.”
The European Commission today confirmed
plans to radically cut its internal sugar price by 36
per cent over a period of four years — a steep, sharp
reform that will damage the economies of many sugar dependent
developing countries.
Today’s deal will also allow Europe
to restrict imports from Least Developed Countries (LDCs)
if they increase by more than 25 per cent each year. This
is a direct betrayal of promises to grant full duty and
quota free access for LDCs to Europe from 2009, under
the Everything But Arms Initiative. As a result, full
access could be delayed for another 11 years until 2020.
Oxfam and WWF estimate that the losses to the LDCs from
the potential limit on exports could be up to €1 billion
annually.
In another blow to campaigners and
poor countries, today’s deal does not even guarantee an
end to dumping. Some European compensation payments will
be linked to production and this may mean the incentive
to overproduce is not removed. This could mean the EU
will struggle to comply with a recent WTO ruling against
subsidised exports.
“It is about as bad as it could be,”
said Adam Harrison of WWF. “Many developing countries
have the potential to meet Europe’s demand with sugar
grown to the highest environmental standards but this
deal seriously undermines that potential. Unless Europe
comes up with much more money to help both traditional
suppliers and the Least Developed Countries to adjust,
they will be condemning developing countries to a bleak
future.”
Europe is currently offering a meagre
€40 million in compensation in 2006 to its ex-colonies
(known as the ACP), and nothing to the world’s poorest
countries (the LDCs). In contrast, compensation offers
to European industry and producers have been raised above
€7 billion to convince reluctant member states to sign
up. |
