"HE THAT IS WITHOUT SIN among you, let him first cast a stone . . . " European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson, secure in the knowledge that the Biblical interdiction doesn't disqualify him as a first-stone-thrower, rushed to the television studios to blame the United States for the collapse of the Doha round of trade talks. Those who follow trade matters might remember that Mandelson antagonized first then-United States Trade Representative Bob Zoellick, and then his successor, by rushing to print every time some confidential negotiation wasn't going his way.
Mandelson conveniently ignored the fact that it was his E.U. masters, led by France, who forced Pascal Lamy, director-general of the 149-member World Trade Organization, to suspend the negotiations indefinitely after five frustrating years of trying to get the key players to agree on new trade-opening measures.
President Bush had offered such great reductions in trade-distorting agricultural subsidies (60 percent cuts over five years, followed by a complete phasing out) that Alexander Downer, Australia's foreign minister, called it "a once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity that ought to be grasped." France is in no mood for grasping, so the European Union contented itself with such ludicrous offers as reducing tariffs on high-quality beef from an eye-watering 80 percent to a still-trade-blocking 61 percent, while retaining bogus health restrictions should any imports manage to climb the tariff wall. According to the Wall Street Journal, the French agricultural minister said, "I would prefer the negotiations fail rather than . . . raise questions about . . . agriculture." So
rich French farmers shot down a deal that the World Bank has been saying is crucial if poverty in underdeveloped countries is to be relieved.
France's farmers had help from politically potent farm blocs in Japan and India. And American rice, corn, wheat, and cotton farmers proved unwilling to surrender price supports that encourage them to glut markets that might otherwise absorb produce from poorer developing countries.
Still, America went further than other countries in offering concessions. As U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab pointed out shortly after negotiations were suspended, the European Union "has average agricultural tariffs twice those in the U.S. and domestic supports three times greater than the U.S.," meaning that in the absence of major concessions, its markets would remain effectively closed to the products of America's far more efficient farmers.
Sherman Katz, of the Carnegie Endowment for Peace, says "All is not lost until all is lost." But, even though Schwab says the suspension "doesn't mean the U.S. is giving up," resuscitation is unlikely--especially since many intended beneficiaries of freer trade, meaning developing countries, are not so sure that they want to see China completely unleashed. The so-called fast-track authority that allows the president to put any trade deal before Congress on a take-it-or-leave-it basis expires on June 30, 2007. The law requires him to allow Congress 90 days to consider any agreement, so there is precious little time left for the negotiators to reassemble and iron out differences that have endured through five years of acrimonious meetings.
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