"Implications of Cancun"

Walden Bello, September 23, 2003

The collapse of the Fifth Ministerial of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in Cancun, Mexico, last Sunday, Sept. 14, was an event of historic proportions.

Cancun has several massive implications.First, the collapse represented a victory for people throughout the world, not a "missed opportunity" for a global deal between North and South. Doha was never a "development round." And what little promise it offered for development had been betrayed long before Cancun. Not even the most optimistic developing country came to Cancun expecting some concessions from the big rich countries in the interest of development. Most developing country governments came to Cancun with a defensive stance. The big challenge was not that of forging a historic New Deal but that of preventing the US and the EU from imposing new demands on the developing countries while escaping any multilateral disciplines on their trade regimes.

In this regard, it was not the developing countries that brought about the collapse, as US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick implied in his final press conference. That responsibility lies squarely with the United States and Europe. When the second revision of the draft of the ministerial text appeared early on Saturday, September 13, it was clear that the US and the European Union were not willing to make any significant cuts on their high levels of agricultural subsidization even as they continued to intransigently demand that the developing countries bring down their tariffs. It was also clear that the EU and US were determined to disregard the Doha Declaration's stipulation that the explicit consensus of all member states was required to begin negotiations on the "Singapore issues."

Full story is here: Bello