Global trade: we need each other

International talks aimed at ushering in a new era of economic cooperation collapsed in Geneva last week after seven years of negotiations.

This is bad news for those concerned with global poverty, though hardly surprising. The collapse represents a blow to global cooperation and sends out bad signals for those who feel more cooperation is necessary in other areas, including efforts to curb global warming.

From the U.S. viewpoint, China and India are the chief culprits. These are the emerging global giants on the world stage. U.S. negotiators accused them of maintaining tariffs to protect their own farmers.

China and India, meanwhile, argued that billions in continuing U.S. farm subsidies distort world commodity markets and undercut subsistence farmers overseas.

U.S. trade policy has emerged over the years from the same economic interests that shaped the once-every-five-year Farm Bill, which was passed earlier this year.

Farm Bill reform advocates, including many church and antihunger groups, argued against the continuation of U.S. commodity subsidies, which, they said, mostly go to wealthy agricultural corporations. Further, these reformers cited instances in which our farm subsidies undercut markets overseas, hurting the poor.

After months of high hopes that these commodity supports might be curtailed, they were kept in place when the bill was enacted in June. The lobbyists had their way once again.

Big money reigns in Congress and again has sabotaged fair play both in the short run and in setting a context for international cooperation that is desperately needed to stave off global environmental trends that will almost certainly bring the human family to its knees.

At one level, the Geneva talks failed because the world's global giants could not come to terms on farm subsidies. No nation was willing to relent on the issue of how and whether to protect their farmers from imported produce. However, the difference among these so-called giants' farmers is significant and should bring any person of conscience to greater reflection.

U.S. agricultural subsidies have grown out of a political system that rewards big money and defies reason. Chinese and Indian protection measures, while marking these nations' larger global imprints, are aimed at protecting farmers that live at levels often not far removed from subsistence.

In the final days of the talks, Chinese negotiators insisted that Beijing must protect its poor farmers, imposing tariffs on certain commodities such as rice, cotton and sugar in case of falling prices or a sudden import surge. Meanwhile, they blamed the "selfish and short-sighted behavior" of wealthy nations for their unwillingness to scrap their own huge subsidies.

The United States and the European Union want greater access to the service sector in emerging economies, which in turn want greater access to Western markets for their farm products.

It sounds like we need each other. But that doesn't mean we are now going to get along fine.

Some analysts say the spread of free trade is likely to shift toward more modest bilateral agreements or the expansion of regional trading blocs. There will be plenty of time for further analysis. For now, the rich, with far more wiggle room, were not willing to cede advantage enough.

Increasingly, it looks like this failure, this chance to bridge, even partially, the gap between rich and poor, and between rich nation and poor nation, is taking us--all of us--down together.

COPYRIGHT 2008 National Catholic Reporter
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning