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FAFTA braces for battle against Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership'
THE HANS INDIA |   Jun 16,2017 , 04:03 AM IST



Title : TWN Info: North to try to bury DDA, push e-commerce & MSME talks at MC11
Date : 2017-06-16

Contents:

TWN Info Service on Trade and UN Sustainable Development
16 June 2017
Third World Network


North to try to bury DDA, push e-commerce & MSME talks at MC11
Published in SUNS #8481 dated 14 June 2017

Geneva, 13 Jun (D. Ravi Kanth) -- Major developed countries and their "allies" in the developing world have intensified efforts to quietly bury the Doha Development Agenda negotiations while launching negotiations on electronic-commerce and micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) at the World Trade Organization's eleventh ministerial conference in Buenos Aires in December, several ministers and trade envoys told SUNS.
Encouraged by the positions adopted by the United States at the informal ministerial meeting of select countries in Paris last week, the developed countries - the European Union, Japan, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Norway and Switzerland - along with Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, Chile, Colombia, Singapore, and Hong Kong-China are preparing the ground for launching negotiations on e-commerce and MSMEs in Buenos Aires under the banner of "development-oriented" priorities, said trade envoys familiar with the development.
Following the deliberations in Paris, the proponents of e-commerce and MSMEs are assuming that the US will not walk away from the WTO despite the adverse pronouncements made by the Trump administration.
Trade ministers and envoys who took part in the Paris meeting maintain that Washington will announce its bilateral and multilateral trade priorities, including its review of the work at the WTO, in October, as per the 180-day review announced by the Trump administration.
The US will then make its positions clear on the outcomes it will either support or remain silent at the Buenos Aires meeting, said a source from a major developed country who asked not to be quoted.
Probably, the US will make it explicitly clear that the Doha Round is dead and that it will not accept its continuation in any form, in the 180-day policy review.
The US has already said that it will not negotiate minimal improvements, such as transparency and due process in the anti-dumping provisions, at the Doha rules negotiating body meeting.
Effectively, the US will allow fisheries subsidies negotiations in the Doha rules dossier but not improvements in anti-dumping provisions. In short, members must make commitments in fisheries subsidies without securing commensurate outcomes in other areas of the rules negotiations.
Until now, the proponents of MSMEs and electronic commerce were unable to muster courage to openly declare that the Doha Round is dead and that they will not participate in negotiations on the outstanding issues as per the Doha Work Program (DWP), the source said.
But, after the US makes its position clear on the termination of the Doha Round, the decks will be cleared for a formal burial in Buenos Aires by the silent supporters of the US position on the Doha issues.
Consequently, the remaining members - who strongly support the Doha Work Program - in Africa, Asia, and South America will not be able to resist the so-called new "development-oriented" issues on MSMEs and electronic commerce, these sources believe.
For the last many months, particularly since the Nairobi meeting, the supporters of the new issues have not mentioned the Doha Work Program even remotely in their proposals either on domestic support or fisheries subsidies.
However, they have now added the tag of "development-oriented" to their proposals on MSMEs, e-commerce, and other issues which are not part of the Doha Work Program.
The proponents will also make a concerted effort to sound their new proposals in Washington so as to get a tacit approval from the US administration, the source said.
Further, the proponents of the new issues will seemingly engage on mandated-issues such as the permanent solution for public stockholding programs for food security and special safeguard mechanism.
However, the proponents of MSMEs and e-commerce will doubly ensure that either there is no outcome on the PSH (public stockholding programs) or it is twisted and burdened with conditionalities that will make the solution infructuous, the source suggested.
An early test for the proposals on the new issues will come in the two meetings of capital-based senior officials from select countries - which will be organized by Argentina next month in Geneva.
Those two meetings will finalize the likely agenda for the Buenos Aires meeting before the summer break in August.
Subsequently, for almost two months - i. e September and the first half of October - efforts will be further mounted to finalize the elements of the proposed issues so that the select group of ministers could discuss in Marrakesh in October, the source maintained.
As part of the "development-oriented" priorities for the Buenos Aires meeting, Argentina along with Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay submitted a proposal on MSMEs as "a development outcome" for the eleventh ministerial meeting.
In their four-page proposal, the four countries said "MSMEs should become an important component of a development-oriented agenda at the WTO."
"By undertaking to consider the issue of MSMEs as part of future discussions within the framework of the WTO, Members have the opportunity to take a decisive step to accomplish the WTO's mission of contributing to economic development and raising standards of living," the four countries argued.
Under the banner of "friends of development", the four countries maintained that "while some challenges are shared by MSMEs from both developed and developing countries, particular attention and specific positive efforts should be aimed at levelling the playing field in favour of MSMEs from developing countries and least developed countries (LDCs), which face additional obstacles and gaps in productivity."
As part of the "international trade issues related to MSMEs," the four countries want members to discuss issues such as "information and transparency", "trade facilitation," "e-commerce," "MSMEs and trade financing," and other issues such as "concrete actions to help reduce trade costs of non-tariff barriers (NTBs), which place a disproportionate burden on MSMEs, and technical assistance and capacity building initiatives focused on trade needs of MSMEs."
Further, the four South American countries urged "all Members to present their proposals and suggestions on the topics they suggested."
"We call the membership to participate in the open-ended, informal dialogue on Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises ("Friends of MSMEs") to explore concrete measures that Members could take to enable their participation in world trade," they argued in their proposal.
The four countries said members most work together "in order to adopt, at the Ministerial Conference in Buenos Aires, a Ministerial Decision creating a Work Program [launching negotiations] that addresses the specific needs of MSMEs."
In short, the stage is set for the burial of the Doha Development Agenda negotiations while launching negotiations on new issues under the false banner of "development-oriented" priorities.
It remains to be seen whether the other developing countries who worked hard on the developmental issues in the Doha agenda for the past 16 years will let their core issues to be buried without any outcome once and for all in Buenos Aires or they would unitedly resist such an outcome, if necessary, by ensuring failure of MC11 at Buenos Aires as at Cancun, sources said. +


 Jun 16 2017 : The Times of India (Hyderabad)
`RCEP trade policy to hit farmers hard'
Hyderabad:
TIMES NEWS NETWORK

After farmers and workers in the country weathered the impact of WTO, a new threat now looms in the form of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which India will soon become a signatory .

Ahead of a meeting in Hyderabad in July of trade representatives of 17 countries, NGOs working on farmer and worker rights said the RCEP free trade agreement will negatively impact livelihoods of farmers and workers.

Representatives of the Telangana Rythu JAC, All India langana Rythu JAC, All India Kisan Sabha, AIKMS, Rythu Swarajya Vedika and Telangana Raithanga Samiti, trade unions such as AITUC, IFTU, PSI and Dalit Women's Union and people's organizations such as National Alliance of Dalit Organizations, Jana Vigyana Vedika, Dalit Bahujan Front and Doctors Without Borders were among those who spoke with the media here on Thursday on the proposed free trade agreement and its impacts on India.

They said they will chalk out a plan to protest and oppose India's entry when the 18th round of RCEP takes place in the city from July 17 to July 28. They also said they will hold a `People's Convention on RCEP and Free Trade Agreements' in the city during the last week of July .

They said RCEP requires countries to make import duties to zero as soon as the agreement comes into force. Farmers would not get good prices for their crops because of cheap imports. Dairy farmers will face dumping from Australia and New Zealand, which produces 500% surplus milk compared to their requirement. 



Farmers, workers gear up to resist RCEP terms
Our Bureau

Plan to flag malefic effect on economy
Hyderabad, June 15:  

As India gets ready to host the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) meeting among ASEAN members, a group of farmers, trade unions, intellectuals and non-governmental organisations have gathered here to oppose the talks.

They alleged that the provisions of the free trade agreements could severely hurt the Indian economy and could impact the incomes of farmers, the dairy industry, agri-based industries and some other sectors.

The meeting here on Wednesday was intended to educate stakeholders and discuss the likely adverse impacts of the RCEP on the Indian economy and on livelihoods.

The crucial round of the RCEP is scheduled to be held in Hyderabad in July, with representatives from 16 ASEAN members and representatives from the countries that were associated with it forming into working groups to deliberate on various aspects of the partnership.

Talking on the RCEP negotiations, Afsar Jafri of the Focus on the Global South, alleged that there was no transparency in the deliberations. “There is no process of ratification by Parliament. The States are not being taken into confidence though agriculture is a State subject in India,” he said.

The RCEP is one of the three largest ‘mega regional’ FTAs (free trade agreements) being negotiated in the world. Apart from India, the RCEP includes China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand, along with the 10 ASEAN countries.

Shalini Bhutani, a Delhi-based researcher on FTAs, said the RCEP was more demanding than the WTO (World Trade Organisation). “The WTO offers some flexibility, but the RCEP offers none,” she said.

The RCEP requires countries to reduce make import duties to zero as soon as the agreement comes into force.

Representatives from AITUC, IFTU, Telangana Rythu Joint Action Committee, Rythu Swarajya Vedika, Telangana Raithanga Samiti, National Alliance of Dalit Organisations and Doctors Without Borders attended the meeting to discuss the RCEP fallout.

“The next meeting of the committee will happen on June 19 to chalk out the specific actions planned to protest the RCEP negotiations,” Kiran Kumar Vissa of Rythu Swarajya Vedika, said.






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