Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-05-Speech-2-016"
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"en.20060905.5.2-016"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the Doha Development Round has failed. What was it meant to develop? That is the core issue. Was it only trade – trade for trade’s sake – that was meant to develop, or was it the intention that more trade should bring development in its wake? For if the latter is what is intended, then there is a great deal more that must be included in the negotiations; it will be necessary to ask what contribution trade makes in the various countries in terms of raised social standards, of improved protection for the environment, of enhanced quality of life. That is a quite different approach from a desire, above all else, to open up markets in order to exchange bigger trade margins, for there can be no reciprocity then.
Solidarity is about the stronger helping the weaker, and what that means is that the more developed countries must give more than those that have not developed to the same degree. It is not only quantity that is at issue here; it also means a qualitatively different approach, not to mention the insight that those who have not yet developed the market in their own countries must be enabled to do this before anything else happens. It may be that they will need to keep their markets closed for a time before they can be opened up.
What use is it to many developing countries to be allowed to export to the European Union if they have no products they can export, quite simply because they cannot even yet feed their own people? Yet, at the same time, these countries are told that if they are to be allowed to do that, they must be so good as to open up their markets to our services and our industries. No agreement will ever be reached if our way of negotiating never rises above this, and I say that as one who is fanatical in support for a multilateral system.
Commissioner Mandelson, you will recall that I have, on very many occasions, asked you whether you really believe that the USA is interested in a multilateral conclusion to the WTO round. I have always said that I do not. The Americans can defend their interests better if they are not tied down by multilateral agreements. That is why it is much more important that the European Union should join together with the G20, and that is something to which we must, of course, give renewed consideration in view of the immense differences between the countries of the South.
This cannot be only about opening up markets if the consequence of doing so is to put the European market at the mercy of Brazilian agri-business, which is huge and dominated by three families; in no way whatever does that do anything to help these countries.
I believe that what we need to do is to rethink our approach. We want trade. Again and again, you say that we want free trade. We can have an ideological disagreement about that; I do not want that sort of liberalisation, but let us leave that to one side for a moment. What matters is not so much that we should have free trade, but that trade should be made fair. Fair trade is just trade, and ‘just’ does not mean ‘equal’. If the same standards are applied to all categories of countries as regards reduction of tariffs and the opening-up of their markets, then that may be no more than equal treatment, but it is not just.
You must change the mandate that you have been given; this is the approach that you need. If you want to advance trade, you have to bear in mind – and, indeed, make it your priority to do so – the circumstances of the individual countries and the stage of development that they have reached."@en1
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