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From Africa Recovery, Vol.17 #2 (July 2003), page 24 COTTON Four African nations have challenged the forthcoming World Trade Organization ministerial meeting in Cancún, Mexico, in September, to agree to rapidly phase out all production and export subsidies for cotton. The countries - Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali - are all heavily dependent on cotton and their economies have been hit hard by a depressed world market flooded with a highly subsidized crop from rich nations. In a proposal submitted to the WTO in June, the countries stress that their "only specific interest" in the current round of negotiations, launched in Doha, Qatar, in 2001, is the elimination of cotton subsidies. "Our countries are not asking for charity, neither are we requesting preferential treatment or aid," President Blaise Compaoré of Burkina Faso told the WTO's trade negotiations committee. "We solely demand that, in conformity with WTO basic principles, the free market rule be applied." The proposal, which is supported by 13 other West and Central African countries, calls on the Cancún meeting to set up a mechanism to progressively reduce subsidies and eventually eliminate them by a fixed date. As an immediate and interim measure, it suggests that farmers in least developed countries be compensated for losses incurred because of the subsidies. In West and Central Africa, where more than 90 per cent of
Africa's cotton is grown for export, cotton revenue fell by 31
per cent between 1999 and 2002, mainly as a result of the massive
subsidies paid to cotton farmers in the US, Europe and China.
While African cotton has many advantages - high quality and the
world's lowest costs of production - it cannot compete with the
subsidized cotton. President Compaoré noted that African
producers are ready to face world competition, "on the condition
that it is not distorted by subsidies." This article may be freely reproduced, with attribution to
"Africa Recovery, United Nations". Africa Recovery Tel: (212) 963-6857
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