Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-13-Speech-4-025"
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"en.20000413.2.4-025"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, seven out of every ten bananas eaten in Europe come from Central America via three multinationals, all with reduced customs duties of EUR 75 per tonne instead of EUR 850. We are giving the United States a marvellous present there! Well, it is not enough! The United States wants more. Technically, what does it want? It wants the end of import licences, because the B licences give Community bananas and ACP bananas priority sales over dollar bananas.
But, most of all and politically, the United States actually wants the monopoly of the future Eastern European market for their multinationals. What is Europe doing to face that challenge? It is divided and getting bogged down. We are divided from our German friends. Indeed, because of the ancient links with the 1945 German diaspora to Latin America, Germany has eaten 100% dollar bananas since 1960 – though at first they were ‘armband’ bananas. So much so – it is an open secret – that the three American banana multinationals put their banana butter on SPD and CDU parsnips.
But we are also getting bogged down in technical proposals. Thus the Commission proposes, before surrendering totally to the United States, a six-year transition period when, in essence, there would be three quotas, including the ACP quota and the dollar quota. From 2006, there would no longer be anything but a common customs tariff which would have equal impact on the bananas of the poor of Africa and the bananas of the rich, the multinationals.
We could undoubtedly challenge that, and our excellent rapporteur, Mr Dary, does challenge it. He proposes that the respite of six years be extended to ten years. Another four years, Mr American executioner! And we have tabled amendments too. We call for regionalisation of aid, because Guadeloupe is further away than the Canaries; quarterly payment; cyclone compensation; the maintenance of the ACP quota; historical guidelines for imports, instead of first come, first served.
Well, all that is very fine, but the battle is elsewhere. The battle is for Community preference, first and foremost. We have to choose: either the Canaries, Madeira and the Antilles – or Chiquita. It is regional policy that is at stake. Do we want the outermost regions which depend 100% on bananas, like the Canaries, to survive, or do we want Dole and Chiquita to accumulate more wealth? It is cooperation policy that is at stake. We have to choose: either Africa and the Lomé Convention, or the WTO. We have to choose: either Europe’s social policy and human rights, or the multinational slave-drivers who produce with social costs totalling 8% instead of the 42% social costs in the Canaries, Madeira or the Antilles.
This is about protection of financial interests, because when OLAF disputes a few centimes of Members’ taxi expenses yet is not interested in the annual present of two billion dollars from Chiquita, there is a problem. The United States was found guilty of two billion dollars’ worth of fiscal fraud and it has changed nothing. When the United States alters its policy, we will discuss the mere 191 million for bananas. When the United States stops cheating for the benefit of Boeing, Kodak, Cargil and Ford, we will discuss bananas. In the meantime, we need long, global, political negotiations. We must talk about Iraq, Echelon, Serbia; put everything on the table. Sanction for sanction, retaliation for retaliation. The banana is a moment of truth. Europe can either surrender or stand up and be counted. There is a saying that bananas can be eaten from both ends. Does Europe want to stand up or be eaten from both ends?"@en1
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