> Ultimately, the US and Europe made big concessions to the developing
> world?concessions fiercely resisted by pharmaceutical and steel
> companies in the
> US and farmers in Europe, the WSJ notes. The deal also demonstrated the limits
> of the anti-globalization movement, which successfully blocked any agreement in
> Seattle two years ago.
Gee, thanks! A back-handed compliment, but we should take it. I don't remember their spin of two years giving the activists credit for blocking the agreement.
Limits? Hah, meaningless insult.
> Once force driving the officials toward an agreement was the desire to avoid a
> repeat of the last WTO meeting, which broke down amid rancor and violent
> anti-globalization protests in Seattle, the Washington Post (p.A1) reports. A
> second consecutive flop might have damaged the effectiveness of the
> Geneva-based
> organization.
As opposition to the WTO continues to grow around the world, the Geneva-based organization can expect to see its effectiveness further damaged.
> Speaking for Africa, Kenyan Commerce Minister Mustafa Bello said at a final
> plenary session that the continent was "satisfied with the
> conclusions that have
> been drawn. Unlike in Seattle, Africa has been satisfied with all
> the stages of
> consultations," AFP reports.
All of Africa is satisified? How did they find enough hotel rooms in Qatar for all of Africa?
> By any account, the sweetest victory for developing countries in Doha was the
> agreement that a WTO accord on patent protection does not prevent them from
> manufacturing or importing cheaper, generic medicines to combat public health
> scourges such as AIDS. The text approved at the meeting, while reiterating a
> commitment to the WTO copyright protection agreement, states that it "does not
> and should not" prevent WTO members from taking steps to protect public health.
> That language is seen as giving developing countries greater freedom
> to override
> drug patents in a public health crisis.
Let's just scrap all of the IP agreements and treaties.
> Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Lafer described the text as an important step
> in responding to criticism levelled at the Geneva-based WTO. "The declaration
> doesn't change the trade-related aspects of intellectual property
> rights (TRIPS)
> agreement at all, but provides a new view of it which is public
> health-friendly," he said.
In other words, this patent authoritarianism has been a PR debacle for pharmaceutical companies.
> Added Michael Bailey of Oxfam International: "Doha sends a strong message that
> people's health overrides the interests of big drug companies."
Does this mean that Oxfam has sold out and know supports the WTO? How can any NGO person say that with a straight face? We all know that profit is still the overriding interests of big Pharma.
> Many developing countries, particularly the poorest, came of age in
> Doha, the FT
> (p.6) says in a separate report. Led by Nigeria, Tanzania and Uganda, they
> proved adept at building coalitions, formulating goals and
> coordinating tactics.
These countries cam of age in Doha? Did this involve some kind of ritual like walking on hot coals, or was this more like a Qatari-style hazing?
> Developing countries at the meeting were adamant in resisting EU demands that
> the new round encompass negotiations on the relationship between environmental
> protection and trade, notes AFP. While developing country officials
> were unable
> to head off such negotiations entirely, they managed to secure
> assurances in the
> text they would not irrevocably lead to tight links between trade and the
> environment.
> Further, the New York Times (p.A30) says in an editorial that the 144
> nations of
> the WTO defied expectations and their own protectionist instincts yesterday by
> approving an agenda that over the next three years could produce an invaluable
> array of market-opening reforms. Though late objections by France and India
> threatened to scuttle the talks, and perhaps the WTO as well, the meeting ended
> with an exhausted but deserved sense of success.
The NY Times is an expert on this? Perhaps they should get a thumbs up from Robert Ebert while they are at. Shit, if you read between the lines here, the WB seems desperate to re-legitimize the neoliberal project embodied in the WTO.
> Delegates came to Doha last week acutely aware of the compromises needed to
> launch a new round of trade liberalization. In the end, everyone in Doha gave
> something, and everyone?especially developing countries?got something, says the
> editorial.
Hopefully, they gave each other anthrax.
> In a related editorial entitled "Doha Does It," the Financial Post says that
> according to the World Bank, products from Third World countries face trade
> barriers roughly twice as a high as those facing products from developed
> nations. But with Doha ending in success -- the 142 countries have come to
> agreement on a new round of trade talks beginning next year -- it seems the
> world's wealthy nations have finally matched actions to words.
More talk of "success." Is it possible to send the World Bank to one of those self-esteem-building seminars?
Hey, I've got an idea! Since the WB isn't feeling loved and needs to something to be successful, why don't we pool our resources and buy the WB a fat gift certificate to Successeries. I wonder if they have any of those "teamwork" posters with pictures of Qatar on them?
> Agriculture posed the greatest stumbling block to success in Doha. As James
> Wolfensohn, head of the World Bank, pointed out to the BBC this week, it is
> folly for rich nations to provide US$50-billion a year in aid to poor nations
> while at the same time offering US$350-billion in subsidies to their own
> farmers.
They could just get rid of the problem: capitalism. Let the folks in poor nations own their own land and grow food for themselves.
> While no one will ever agree with all the give and take of a major
> negotiation,
> it is important to dwell on the many accomplishments of Doha, says
> the Financial
> Post. The first is that a world-wide agreement has been reached
> --years of riots
> by ignorant hordes of anti-globalization protesters notwithstanding.
Hah! That's pretty funny. The World Bank could start a second career in stand-up comedy once we disband it.
Ignorant hordes indeed.
> The
> agreement holds out promise for the eventual elimination of harmful
> agricultural
> subsidies, the developed world has proven it can accept domestic
> sacrifices to
> facilitate economic growth in disadvantaged nations and the international
> trading structure has been strengthened at a time when the global economy is
> weakening and the world is at war against terrorism. Not bad for six days work,
> says the editorial.
Wishful thinking that will eventually be dashed on the rocks of political reality.
> Meanwhile, campaigners against corporate-led globalization yesterday condemned
> the WTO agreement on a new trade round, judging it a "disaster for the world's
> poor," the FT reports. "This is a massive defeat for poor people around the
> world," said World Development Movement Director Barry Coates. "The much-hyped
> development round is empty of development ? Developing countries do
> not have the
> capacity or the wish to negotiate these new agreements."
Hey, and they haven't even bothered to talk to the anti-capitalists, who can't be bought off in future years.
> Third World Network Director Martin Khor says in an interview with Libération
> (France, p.26), "The final text limits the right of each country to promote
> its own development model. It will multiply social and economic
> tensions. This
> was a missed occasion: the WTO could have played the card of regulating
> globalization, but it took the risk of deregulating it further still."
The WTO could have done the world a favor and simply disbanded.
> Trade unions also criticized the failure of the Doha meeting to achieve
> significant progress on social justice and the protection of basic workers'
> rights, notes the FT.
Not bad, for the WB. I hope they are feeling better now that they went to this 6-day self-esteem seminar in Qatar. Now when are they going to listen to the people who don't want any of this nonsense?
I'm headed down to Successories to get the World Bank a "Congratulations on your new trade agreement" card.
<< Chuck0 >>
Infoshop.org -> http://www.infoshop.org/ Alternative Press Review -> http://www.altpr.org/ Practical Anarchy Online -> http://www.practicalanarchy.org/ Anarchy: AJODA -> http://www.anarchymag.org/ Factsheet 5 -> http://www.factsheet5.com/ MutualAid.org (coming soon) AIM: AgentHelloKitty
INTERNATIONALISM IN PRACTICE
An American soldier in a hospital explained how he was wounded: He said, "I was told that the way to tell a hostile Vietnamese from a friendly Vietnamese was to shout ‘To hell with Ho Chi Minh!’ If he shoots, he’s unfriendly. So I saw this dude and yelled ‘To hell with Ho Chi Minh!’ and he yelled back, ‘To hell with President Johnson!’ We were shaking hands when a truck hit us."
(from 1,001 Ways to Beat the Draft, by Tuli Kupferburg).