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New WTO Director General Lamy urged to review effects of trade rules on the poor and environment
(Geneva/Brussels, 26 May 2005) The future Director General of the World
Trade Organisation (WTO), Pascal Lamy, has been asked to urgently review
the impacts of international trade rules on the poor and the
environment. The former EU Trade Commissioner will be appointed Director
General later today at a General Council Meeting in Geneva at the WTO.
Lamy will lead the WTO as of 1 September, two months before the WTO's
next Ministerial conference in HongKong. Mr. Lamy has stated that the
conclusion of the WTO's Doha negotiations will be his "objective number
one, number two and number three" (1) This fits with Lamy's track
record, which has already been severely criticized by NGOs. He has
aggressively promoted the interests of big business, often to the
detriment of people and the environment, and in the face of outright
opposition from many developing countries. (2)
Commenting on his appointment, Alexandra Wandel, trade programme co-
ordinator at Friends of the Earth Europe said:
"As new Director General, Lamy must break with his tradition of serving
primarily big business. In Seattle and Cancun he said that the WTO is a
medieval organisation. If he really wants to transform the WTO, he must
immediately initiate an environmental and social review of the global
trade system. We need trade rules that work for people and the
environment. "
Shortly after he starts in September, the WTO will also issue a critical
ruling on the issue of whether countries have the right to restrict
trade in genetically modified food and crops (GMOs). The ruling will be
the result of a complaint filed at the WTO by the US, Argentina and
Canada, challenging the European Union's stance on GMOs. Last year more
than 100,000 citizens from 90 countries and more than 544 organizations
representing 48 million people sent a citizens' objection to the WTO
saying the WTO should not undermine the sovereign right of any country
to protect its citizens and the environment from GM foods and crops.
Wandel said:
"Tens of thousands of individuals around the world have signed a
petition to send a clear message to the WTO to take their hands off our
food. The World Trade Organisation has no right to impose genetically
modified crops and food on any country. All around the world, people
have backed this call. This will be a test case for the WTO and Lamy in
particular."
A ruling in favour of the US and the biotech industry would force
countries, consumers and farmers around the world to accept GM foods.
This would have serious implications particularly in developing
countries who do not want to accept GM foods or want to stop them until
they have laws in place. This would allow companies such as Monsanto to
move in and take control of the world's food supply and threaten food
security, wildlife and the environment as well as people's health.(3)
Contact:
Alexandra Wandel, trade programme co-ordinator at Friends of the Earth
Europe
Phone: + 49 172 748 39 53
Notes:
(1) Pascal Lamy at a media conference, see Reuters, 17 May 2005.
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?
storyID=8517133&type=businessNews
(2) Lamy's insistence on expanding the WTO's agenda to include
investment, competition and government procurement against the will of
many developing countries and civil society, was a critical factor in
the break down of the WTO talks in September 2003 in Cancun. Until
recently, Lamy has also aggressively pursued the opening up of
developing country markets in the field of essential public services
such as water. So, for example, during preparations for the current
round of GATS talks, which started in 2000, the water giant Suez,
banking interest Barclays, PricewaterhouseCoopers, and numerous other
large European multinationals came together under the umbrella of the
European Services Forum (ESF), with far-reaching support from the Trade
Commissioner. A high-level official from the Commission's trade
directorate told industry representatives, "The European Commission is
[...] going to rely heavily on the European Services Forum. [...] We are
going to rely on it just as heavily as on member state direct advice in
trying to formulate our objectives.The ESF certainly played a crucial
role in forming the EU's list of demands for services liberalisation
presented to other WTO member states"[1] See Behind GATS 2000: Corporate
Power at Work, TNI?Corporate Europe Observatory, http://www.tni.org/reports/wto/wto4.pdf
(3) Lamy's track record on biotech is worrying, to say the least. At
the Seattle WTO Ministerial Conference in 1999, Lamy tried to make a
deal with the United States to set up a WTO working group for developing
GM product rules. EU environment ministers furiously rejected Lamy's
deal, which ran counter to the previously agreed EU negotiating
position. In the last few years, Lamy and other members of the European
Commission have lifted the moratorium on GMOs under pressure from the
US, the WTO and biotech companies. He did this despite the fact that
according to opinion polls, 71% of Europeans refuse genetically modified
food.
Friends of the Earth
Europe campaigns for sustainable and fair societies and for the
protection of the environment,
unites more than 30 national organisations with thousands of local
groups
and is part of the world's largest grassroots environmental network,
Friends of the Earth International.
