In the buildup to Hong Kong, as much of the World Trade Organization negotiating buzz centred on the intricacies of agricultural subsidies and trade rules, Canadian international development minister Aileen Carroll was insisting that the guiding objective of the talks should not be forgotten.
“This is the development round and we must never lose sight of that,” Carroll said. “That has been very much at the centre of our planning.”
The minister responsible for the Canadian International Development Agency has been one of a small group of federal ministers planning Canada’s strategy for this WTO round.
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“We have been spending many, many hours of meetings in preparation for this,” she said. “I believe there is a real opportunity here and a real recognition that development has to be at the core of any deal. I remain optimistic that it will happen.”
That optimism is not shared by many of the non-governmental development organizations that she considers her allies.
Mark Fried of Oxfam Canada said Carroll has been working on the issue but there is little evidence of the political results of her work in Ottawa’s positions.
“I honestly don’t see much in Canada’s WTO positioning that supports development,” the veteran development lobbyist said. “In fact, in some ways Canada’s WTO positioning is contradictory on the development issue. In some regards on the agricultural side, Canada is supporting special safeguard rules for developing country products and that is good, but then it also joins with other developed countries in insisting that as part of any deal, developing countries must open their markets to more imports and that could undermine local economies.”
Fried said government negotiators and planners seem fixated on contentious agricultural issues such as the fate of supply management protections, the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly and better access to foreign markets for exporters.
“I understand that because it is on those issues that the government gets heat from Canadian producers,” he said. “We’re trying to put as much heat as we can on them around development issues, although it doesn’t always have as much effect.”
One complication is the nature of the issue and the countries affected by it.
The development issue, often reflected in agricultural proposals to give developing countries more ability to protect sensitive products or sectors and a longer time to lower or dismantle trade protections or support programs, is complicated in the WTO talks by the fact that some countries given the “development” designation are significant and emerging agricultural powerhouses.
There are concerns among Canadian farm leaders, reflected by Canadian WTO negotiators, that special rules for exporters such as Brazil, China and India would give them unfair market advantages.
Trade liberalization advocates insist that increased trade is the best development tool. Give developing world farmers access to rich markets and their industry will grow and modernize through reinvestment.
Development advocates scoff that the argument is at best na•ve and perhaps self-serving because many developing country farm and food sectors are not capable of meeting quality and safety standards required in developed country markets.
Meanwhile, lower trade barriers into developing country markets would allow disruptive cheap produce from rich countries where support for farmers will always be higher, no matter what the WTO subsidy cutting deal says.
Development advocates hope they might benefit if the Hong Kong meeting becomes deadlocked over key agricultural issues. In this scenario, the European Union could try to build support for a less contentious package of development policies.
“We hope that happens and we will be in Hong Kong to pressure Canada to be part of any positive development like that,” said Fried.
It is not clear who they will be pressuring.
Until the government fell and an election was called for Jan. 23, Carroll had planned to be in Hong Kong Dec. 13-18 with trade minister Jim Peterson and agriculture minister Andy Mitchell.
The election campaign may well keep her at home, trying to hang onto her central Ontario seat north of Toronto.
The Barrie-area riding in 1993 became the first Ontario constituency to elect a Reform party MP. Carroll won it for the Liberals in 1997 and has held it since, although the Conservative candidate reduced her victory margin from almost 9,000 to 1,400 votes in 2004.
