Trade Policy Note Final-rev08 - Development
Trade Policy Note Final-rev08 - Development
Trade Policy Note Final-rev08 - Development
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Liberalization and Food Security<br />
A key coalition of developing countries, the G33 48 are seeking to make any further<br />
liberalization in agricultural trade conditional upon the preservation of their policy<br />
space to intervene to protect livelihoods, and ensure food security. This approach has<br />
been manifested in the Special Products 49 and Special Safeguards proposals currently<br />
before the WTO. While it is recognized that such measure could increase import<br />
prices of foodstuffs for urban consumers , on balance rural producers are the poorest<br />
members of society in developing countries, far poorer than those segments of the<br />
population who purchase imported food. 50<br />
Box 17: Identifying Special Products<br />
Criteria: The Special Products (SP) proposal aims at ensuring that future commitments on<br />
market access for agriculture will permit a special degree of flexibility for products central to<br />
the objectives of (a) food security (all people have physical and economic access to sufficient<br />
safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs for an active and healthy life), (b)<br />
livelihood security (adequate and sustainable access to resources or assets by household and<br />
individuals to realize a minimum standard of living, recognizing that poor farmers have very<br />
low risk thresholds) and (c) rural development (the potential of an agricultural product to<br />
improve the living standards of the rural population including both directly and through its<br />
forward linkages to non-farm rural activities). 51<br />
The question of the criteria to be used in determining which products are “spec ial” is the<br />
subject of current debate in the WTO and is also relevant to developing countries in their<br />
national agricultural trade policies. Basic indicators that should be examined include:<br />
- Food security: the share of consumption of the product in total agricultural consumption,<br />
and the share of its domestic production in domestic consumption. These could be used as<br />
indicators of the importance of the product for food security. A certain percentage of<br />
domestic consumption of the basic food basket should be met by domestic production,<br />
since dependence on imports create high vulnerability for products for which world trade<br />
volume is relatively small compared to world demand;<br />
- Livelihood security: the share of employment as a result of production of the product in<br />
the total agricultural labour force; if the majority of farmers producing a particular<br />
product are low income, and resource poor, any disruption caused by imports can cause<br />
deprivation and even starvation;<br />
- Rural development: the share of production of the product in total agricultural<br />
production. This could serve as an indicator of the contribution of the product to rural<br />
development. 52<br />
48 G33 members are: Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Botswana, China, Congo, Cote d’Ivoire,<br />
Cuba, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Jamaica, Kenya,<br />
Korea, Mauritius, Madagascar, Mongolia, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Panama, Peru,<br />
Philippines, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Senegal, Suriname,<br />
Tanzania, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Uganda, Venezuela, Zambia and Zimbabwe.<br />
49 According to the terminology used in the WTO, “sensitive” products are those for which developed<br />
countries are seeking less than formula liberalization.<br />
50 See Stiglitz and Charlton op. cit p. 230<br />
51 See Proposal of G33 on the modalities for the design ation and treatment of any agricultural product<br />
as a Special Product (SP) by any developing country member, JOB(05)304, 22 November 2005<br />
http://www.agtradepolicy.org/output/resource/G33_proposal_SPs_22Nov05.pdf.<br />
52 FAO Support to the WTO Negotiations (2003), www.fao.org.docrep/005.<br />
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