Commonwealth Secretary General Don McKinnon on Tuesday denounced a sharp rise in US farm subsidies, saying it locked developing nations out of lucrative markets and made a mockery of US free trade pledges.
McKinnon, who heads the 54-nation group made up of mainly former British colonies, said the US farm bill signed into law on Monday by President George Bush was an example of rich countries bending the rules for their own benefit.
The law will boost US crop and dairy subsidies by 67%, or $6.4 billion a year.
”The recently announced US Farm Bill makes a farce of the commitments for trade liberalisation reached in Doha and undermines the prospects of developing countries trading their way out of poverty,” McKinnon said, referring to trade talks launched in the Gulf state of Qatar last November.
”How can poor countries believe in the benefits of globalisation when they see the rich countries bending the rules in their own favour?” he said in a statement.
The Commonwealth is a diverse group of 1.7 billion people from 50 developing nations in Africa, Asia and the Pacific alongside Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
Canada, Australia, the European Union and Brazil have all complained the new law contradicts US calls for freer farm trade. But none has vowed to challenge it before the World Trade Organisation.
US officials have argued that EU agricultural subsidies are far larger than Washington’s.
McKinnon said that preaching trade liberalisation to others while practising protectionism ”is not only pure hypocrisy, it smacks of indifference to the poorest people on the planet”.
Raising trade subsidies also undermined poor countries’ confidence in international trade and would in the end threaten international stability, he warned.
”As the only economic and military superpower today, the United States should provide positive leadership on these issues,” McKinnon said.
”If we want a more secure world, we must help create a more inclusive international trading system,” he said. – Reuters