As the final round of consultations to choose a new director-general for the World Trade Organisation (WTO) wrapped up Thursday, former European Union Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy appeared to be leading in the race to head the body.
He was also reported to be the front runner in earlier discussions convened by a three-member WTO panel that is ascertaining which applicant for the post is most likely to be approved by the organisation’s 148 member states.
Lamy’s rival in the leadership contest, Uruguayan Carlos Pérez del Castillo, was formerly an ambassador to the WTO — and also chaired the organisation’s general council, which oversees the work of the WTO.
This week, South Africa found itself on Lamy’s campaign trail when he paid a lightning visit to the country to confer with government officials. The erstwhile commissioner also fielded questions after delivering a speech at the Johannesburg-based South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA), where his skills as both a charmer and a fighter were on ample display.
Inevitably, Lamy’s role in negotiations on European agricultural subsidies was a source of concern — with one interlocutor saying his appointment at the WTO might be seen as akin to putting the fox in the hen house.
These subsidies allow EU farmers to export their produce at prices that agriculturalists in developing states are unable to match, jeopardizing domestic production in these countries. Farmers in poor nations also find it impossible to compete with their European counterparts in other markets.
The dismantling of agricultural trade barriers has proved a political hot potato in Europe, with governments there reluctant to take on powerful farm lobbies. While Lamy was criticised last year by France for making too many concessions in talks on agricultural reform, others have lambasted him for not pursuing the matter still further.
“He was very cautious and very silent on agriculture. This is despite the fact that 70% of Africans rely directly or indirectly on agriculture for their livelihood. This is unacceptable,” Riaz Tayob of the Southern and Eastern African Trade Information and Negotiations Institute said on Wednesday.
“He is, indeed, experienced. But we fear that it’s that experience which he will use to undermine Africa.”
Speaking at SAIIA on May 10, Lamy claimed that his negotiating stance during the years spent as trade commissioner could scarcely have been otherwise. “I was a negotiator for the EU. I was fighting in the EU corner,” he told the audience, adding that he was aware the responsibilities of a WTO director-general would be different.
“You can count on my conviction, on my commitment, and you can be sure of my ability to resist pressure,” Lamy said in a statement delivered before the WTO General Council in Geneva on January 26 as part of his campaign.
This week, he pointed to EU moves to ensure the availability of generic medicines in poor states as evidence that he does have the interests of developing countries at heart.
In October 2004, the European Commission proposed a regulation to prevent EU states from taking action against manufacturers of generic drugs that exported the medicines to countries experiencing health crises.
This put Europe on the road to implementing a decision taken by the WTO a year earlier, permitting generic exports under conditions of need in importing states. Previously, global trade rules had called on firms manufacturing generics only to supply markets of the countries in which they were based — a restriction which posed difficulties in states with little or no drug manufacturing capability.
In spite of this, Tayob urged African countries to support Pérez del Castillo: “Castillo is the better candidate because he is from a developing country. He is in a better situation to understand the issues of poverty.”
However, African, Caribbean and Pacific states, which have special access to EU markets in certain respects, appear to have followed Europe’s lead in throwing their weight behind Lamy. Pérez del Castillo has the support of Latin American states, various Arab countries, China, Australia and New Zealand.
The new WTO director-general will take over from Supachai Panitchpakdi, a Thai whose term expires August 31. His most pressing order of business will be to push for a conclusion of the latest round of trade talks, named after the Qatari capital of Doha where the round was launched in 2001.
The Doha round, intended to put development at the heart of trade talks, was to have been concluded by January 1, 2005. But, negotiations were dealt a blow in 2003 during the biennial ministerial meeting of the WTO, the highest decision-making forum of the organisation.
Wealthy countries used the gathering, held in the Mexican resort of Cancun, to lobby for negotiations on opening government procurement to foreign competition, amongst other matters. But, developing states insisted that such negotiations could not precede an agreement on improved market access for their agricultural products. — IPS