WTO Autopsy

New at Reason: From the windswept coast of rugged Cancun, where hearty Celts till the rocky soil using the same crude stone implements their forebears used thousands of years ago, Ron Bailey assesses the collapse of the WTO ministerial talks.

Comments

[Jason Ligon]

Haha! Take THAT, you wealthy scoundrels!

We poor nations have banded together and, er ... hmm ...

[Citizen]

Wow, that must've been a sight to behold.

So how are the NGOs reacting to this? They're usually how I gauge the sucess of this things. If they're whooopin' it up, then we know it's bad business as usual.

[Zathras]

The NGO's are mourning the failure of the talks, but agricultural trade is an issue they have just discovered so their thinking about it isn't quite clear yet.

Basically, the reason no agreement was reached at Cancun is that Europe did not want one, the Group of 21 countries only wanted one if the developed countries made all the concessions, and Japan and the United States didn't care. Actually the American position is a little more complex than that; USTR Zoellick would be personally happy to make major cuts in farm subsidies, but anything along that line would require Congress to reopen the farm bill passed last year. This is something George Bush and Karl Rove are not interested in doing before the end of 2004.

Zoellick's idea now will be to continue his efforts to maintain momentum behind trade liberalization through the negotiation of bilateral and regional agreements. It's as much as this administration will let him do, and even this course is subject to the same constraints as negotiating in Cancun was.

[Mark Fulwiler]

The U.S. should now eliminate all import taxes, trade barriers and protectionism regardless of what other countries do. The WTO may have failed, but the U.S. government does not have to continue to maintain bad policies.

[Xmas]

I'm not positive, but I think the main problem with US agricultural policy is our subsidies to farmers, not our protective tariffs.

Except for cane sugar, that is.

[Jean Bart]

As far as I could tell the NGOs were pleased; at least some of them were. Remember NGO does not equal "environmental group." There are plenty of pro-free trade NGOs out there as well.

[Anonymous]

please name the free trade NGOs that are pleased with this situation. If posssible, link to quotes or press release that states they are pleased.

thanx

[Jean Bart]

Xmas,

US agricultural tariffs run around 12%; the world average is 62%; of course a subsidy can distort just as much as a tariff can.

[david f]

"please name the free trade NGOs that are pleased with this situation. If posssible, link to quotes or press release that states they are pleased.

thanx "

there's an english language button for the se two sites...

timbro.se
frihandel.nu

both of those swedish groups (NGOs) have,among others, Johan Norberg as a member...

bureaucrash.com has a listing of their efforts, funny anecdotes, and the like.

Jean Bart,
good call: subsidies cause dead weight loss, too...

it's time to break out your micro book -- you can prop up the bed again in a bit -- and look at supply and demand curves and check out subsidies and tariffs and the dead weight loss from either....

cheers,
drf