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By Angelo S.
Samonte, Reporter
Fair Trade
Alliance, a broad coalition of NGOs from the agriculture and
industrial manufacturing sector, said it does not believe that the
breakthrough announced by WTO Director General Pascal Lamy is
achievable within months.
Wigberto Tañada,
the lead convener of FTA, said Lamy did not mention any timetable
when the United States would slash subsidies for its agriculture
sector.
Tañada said:
“We don’t believe in his pronouncements because those are too
vague. We want specific concessions from the developed countries,
particularly from the US, by cutting huge farm support. He didn’t
explain how big the cuts would be. Would it be on staggered basis?
When will be the final elimination?”
In a separate
statement, FTA reiterates its position in the ongoing
Nonagricultural Market Access (NAMA) negotiations, particularly in
determining the coefficient for the adoption of the Swiss formula
for the tariff cuts.
“We propose
a target of 50 percentage points, or minimum of 35, because having
gone over various simulations prepared by the Tariff Commission and
Board of Investments, we believe that targeting a coefficient of 50
will maximize the current policy space of NAMA tariff lines whose
average bound rates is pegged at 23 percent,” it said.
“We also
propose the adoption of a mark-up of 50 or a minimum of 35, to
provide flexibilities for the treatment of unbound tariff lines,
considered to be sensitive and instrumental to economic development.
The FTA also
supports the inclusion of sensitive products in the exclusion list,
saying that the proposed minimum of 10 percent of total tariff lines
will be good for the Philippines: “The FTA firmly stands for the
preservation of the current policy space and work towards the
development of a roadmap for industrial policy harmonization and
upgrading that will make our industries more globally
competitive.”
Reacting to
Lamy’s visit to the Philippines, the Tambuyog Development Center,
an NGO for fishery sector development said the WTO must reconsider
the positions of developing countries by focusing negotiations to
export distorting support instead of market access.
Tambuyog said
talks should also include subsidies being given to industries in
more developed countries rather than tackling market access issues
that only favor industrialized countries.
Besides these
issues, Tambuyog said the global trade body must recognize the need
for protection of less developed countries, particularly their
sensitive sectors through the use of special products (SP) and
special safeguard mechanism (SSM).
would be
detrimental for our industries that remain weak that’s why we
should seek more protection,” Tañada said.
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