WORLD BANK, IMF PRESENTATIONS SPARK DEBATE IN AGRICULTURE COMMITTEE
In an 18 November regular session of the WTO Committee on Agriculture (CoA), the World Bank and IMF made presentations on the topic of net food-importing countries, which some delegates reacted against in their interventions. The CoA annually reviews the possible negative effects of agriculture reform on net food-importing countries. In this context, the World Bank and IMF suggested that countries carefully consider whether or not to ask for exemptions from tariff reduction commitments in agriculture negotiations, as such exemptions did not necessarily improve food security and rural development objectives, but might rather work against them. According to the World Bank, "Unfortunately [...] the concept of food security has been used in the Doha negotiations primarily to suggest that developing countries should be allowed to maintain high barriers to imports of food products as a means of increasing national production, under the rubric of ’special products’ or as a component of the ‘development box’," adding that, "This kind of policy is likely to have only very limited short-term benefits to farmers - and to be counterproductive to the objective of long-run structural food security". Therefore, "The concept of food security and special products could be re-defined to recognise that structural food security is generally reduced, not enhanced, by trade barriers to food imports". The Philippines — which is part of the G-33 group of countries favouring flexibilities for developing countries in agriculture negotiations — stressed however that the designation of ’special products’ for developing countries was progressive, not regressive, and part and parcel to the talks.
The CoA meeting took place within the overall "agriculture week" from 15-19 November (see related story, this issue).
ICTSD reporting.