<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote">From: <b class="gmail_sendername">PHM Global Secretariat</b> <<a href="mailto:secretariat@phmovement.org">secretariat@phmovement.org</a>><br>
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<div style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4"><b>From:</b> <a title="indiansocietyag@yahoo.co.in" href="mailto:indiansocietyag@yahoo.co.in" target="_blank">IndianSocietyFor SustainableAgriculture</a> </div>
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<div><strong><font size="4"> PRESS RELEASE</font></strong></div>
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<div><font color="#660000" size="4">Boycott Mini-Ministerial. It is time to wind up WTO says Bharatiya Krishak Samaj</font></div>
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<div><strong><font color="#660000">New Delhi, July 19 :</font></strong> <font face="Times New Roman">The World Trade Organisation (WTO) is practically hopeless and helpless after successive failures of a series of attempts to revive the multilateral trade negotiations. </font><font face="Times New Roman">As not much progress in multilateral trade negotiations was made on basis of the drafts issued in May this year, the WTO again on July 10 issued two revised drafts – one on agriculture by Crawford Falconer and other on NAMA by Don Stephenson. </font><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">There is practically not much difference in spirit of the drafts issued in July and those released in May. </span>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">The revised WTO text on agriculture has completely ignored the food security and livelihood concerns of the farmers in the developing countries. It has proposed a weak defence against the possible influx of cheap and subsidized imports by suggesting a complicated system for implementation of Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) by the developing countries. In contrast the Special Safeguard (SSG) implemented by the developed countries is simple and effective.</font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">The revised draft, though has the provision for self-designation of Special Products by developing countries, the provision suggested is not enough to protect food security and livelihood concerns. </font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">"All crops grown by farmers in our country are linked to livelihood concerns and therefore we should have the right to designate all crops grown by farmers as Special Products. If the WTO is not willing to give us this right along with an effective SSM then it should allow countries to impose Quantitative Restrictions (QR) to check any possible surge <span> </span>in imports," said the President of Bharatiya Krishak Samaj, Dr Krishan Bir Chaudhary</font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">Unfortunately the revised draft has not proposed much in the direction of calling for a drastic cut in heavy subsidies in the developed countries and sharp reduction in their high tariff barriers. It allowed subsidization and cross-subsidisation through all avenues – AMS box, Blue Box, Green Box. </font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">While allowing developed countries to protect their agriculture the draft has suggested developing countries to open their doors for imports</font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">Without resolving the issue of livelihood protection and food security of the developing countries in general, the revised farm draft has extended some concessions to </font><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">least developing countries (LDCs), small vulnerable economies and 'other developing countries'—this may possible divide the unity amongst the developing countries, if not tackled effectively. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">The revised NAMA draft released by Don Stephenson has sought to take away the flexibilities to industries in the developing countries with the introduction of 'anti-concentration' clause. While the July 2004 Framework agreed that the flexibility cannot be used by developing members to exclude entire HS Chapters, the latest draft suggested restrictions beyond this mandate. Such unduly restrictive clause disregards the realities and sensitivities of the industries in the developing countries. Flexibilities are more needed for the protection of small and medium-sized industries. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">The revised NAMA draft still continues to link tariff reduction coefficients with flexibilities. The flexibilities have to be treated on stand-alone basis and there should be no trade-off between flexibilities and tariff reduction coefficients. The latest NAMA draft has also attempted to create a division in the unity of the developing countries by proposing additional flexibilities to some. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">The proposal for negotiations in remanufactured goods finds place in the revised draft indicating convergence on this issue, which is far from reality. In the earlier draft, the issue was under the square brackets reflecting lack of consensus on the subject. </span></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><span style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">The controversial coefficient ranges for developed and developing countries for cutting tariffs through a "Swiss formula" still remains in the May text as also the percentages of tariff lines that can have flexibilities from the full tariff cuts, according to a "sliding scale". <br>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">The WTO has failed to fulfill the objectives of the Doha Development Round. </font><font face="Times New Roman">This is primarily due to the adamant attitude of the developed world to continue their protectionist regime in agriculture through high subsidies and tariff and ask for market access in the Third World.</font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman">In this context, Bharatiya Krishak Samaj firmly believes that it is high time to wind up the WTO, instead of creating a drama of convening a mini-ministerial on July 21. <span> </span>It could had been better for the Indian Commerce Minister, Kamal Nath to say that India would boycott the mini-ministerial rather saying that he would walk out if the WTO fails to protect the interests of small and marginal farmers and infant industries. There is no doubt that Kamal Nath has made his statement about walkout due to the compulsions of political situation in the country and the upcoming polls, rather than his desire to protect the country's farmers.</font></div>
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<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman"><strong>Dr KRISHAN BIR CHAUDHARY</strong></font></div>
<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><font face="Times New Roman"><strong>President</strong></font></div>
<div style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><strong><font face="Times New Roman">BHARATIYA KRISHAK SAMAJ</font> (Indian Farmers' Organisation</strong></div></div><br></td></tr></tbody></table></div></div></div>