Canadian Wheat Board director Larry Hill says the usual suspect is behind a recent world trade negotiator’s suggestion that organizations such as the wheat board should have their powers drastically curtailed.
There is no international demand that “state trading enterprises” be eliminated, said Hill after meeting with world agricultural trade negotiator Stuart Harbinson.
“It was, of course, confirmed during the meeting that this is fundamentally an American issue,” said Hill, a farmer from Swift Current, Sask. “The United States is pressing for this proposal and the European Union is following conveniently along, presumably as a defensive tactic deflecting attention from their own subsidies.”
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In his “draft modalities” report, Harbinson, who is chairing agricultural negotiations at the World Trade Organization, floated many ideas, including scaling back export subsidies, opening agricultural markets to imports and weakening the power of governments to influence domestic and international markets.
Organizations such as the wheat board would eventually lose their monopoly marketing powers and their ability to finance grain sales with buyers.
Hill said Harbinson told wheat board officials who met with him in Europe that he “had no preconceptions” about the wheat board and his suggestion of severely curtailing the power of state trading enterprises was a reflection of American trade demands, not a conclusion he had personally reached.
Hill said he believes the wheat board is the main target of the American anti-STE push.
“We just have to assume that the U.S. actions are based on politics and that they want to eliminate an efficient and effective competitor,” he said.
“It’s not about free trade. It’s about advantage for the U.S. and their companies in trying to eliminate a competitor.”
Hill and Canadian government officials also met trade representatives from Australia, New Zealand, China, Brazil, Argentina and India.
None of these countries echoed the U.S. demands, Hill said, and were “pretty supportive of our position.”
Harbinson plans to have a revised draft of his report by March 31, but with many countries bitterly opposed to many suggestions in his first text, Hill said the negotiator will have trouble bringing all the players together.
“Whether or not he has agreement to that will be the big issue,” Hill said.
Meanwhile, the U.S. has formally announced that it will ask the WTO to investigate the wheat board’s marketing practices.
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Opposition growing to world trade deal
By Ed White
Winnipeg bureau
markets
LANDMARK, Man. – World trade negotiator Stuart Harbinson said he was trying to stir debate and encourage compromise when he released his “draft modalities report.”
Instead, said the chair of the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, he has stirred defiance and made many countries consider walking away from a new trade agreement.
“He’s pushed people further back into their corners rather than bringing them together,” said Marg Rempel, who recently met with representatives of 50 non-governmental organizations in Geneva, Switzerland, to discuss Harbinson’s report.
“A lot of countries are saying if they don’t get a deal, so what? No deal is better than another bad deal,” said Rempel, a hog and grain producer.
Harbinson’s report calls for countries to reduce import controls and export subsidies, and reduce or eliminate “state trading enterprises” such as the Canadian Wheat Board.
Rempel said farmers in many countries suspect that Harbinson’s recommendations, if implemented, would force developing nations to quickly open their markets while rich countries would slowly be forced to reduce their export subsidies.
She said if trade negotiators want farmers to support the new round of trade talks, they had better ensure that all farmers are included, not just those in the most powerful nations.
