Farm Subsidies Under Fire
Leaders of the developing world are calling on the United States and the European Union to remove farm subsidies and open markets, saying Tuesday that free trade is the only way to alleviate world hunger.
"We are poor. You are rich. Level the playing field!" said Teofisto Guingona, foreign minister of the Philippines.
The message continued on the second day of the U.N. World Food Summit, a four-day meeting at the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization headquarters here that's designed to accelerate efforts to meet U.N. targets to cut hunger.
The United States, on Monday, defended its new farm subsidies and its use of biotechnology in agriculture, two issues that dominated discussion at the summit.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman told the summit Monday that biotechnology can fight hunger by increasing productivity, improving crop quality and reducing the need for chemical pesticides.
Uganda's president, Yoweri Museveni, dismissed the idea that a lack of technology was to blame for world hunger, saying there's more than enough food to go around.
"Let us stop beating around the bush," he said. "The most fundamental problems are not the weather; are not lack of improved seeds.
"The main causes of food shortages in the world are really three: wars, protectionism in agricultural products in Europe, the USA, China, India and Japan, and protectionism in value-added products on the part of the same countries," he said.
Many poor countries say the current international trade framework leaves farmers in the developing world unable to compete with subsidized crops from the United States, the European Union and elsewhere.
Guingona demanded wealthier countries negotiate trade agreements with the poor ones in good faith, saying the World Trade Organization framework shouldn't only benefit the rich.
"Do not in the name of free trade deny us time to integrate our resources, and having integrated them deny us access to your rich markets," he said.
The Colombian president, Andres Pastrana, issued a similar appeal, saying poor countries don't want charity, just a chance to compete.
Canada's agriculture minister, Lyle Vanclief, complained about major new U.S. farm subsidies signed into law by President Bush last month.
"The high level of subsidies depresses prices and effectively shuts out producers from developing nations, and we are concerned that recent decisions in the United States are moving in the wrong direction," Vanclief said.
The president of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, also criticized the new subsidies, which EU officials say violate WTO rules.
Veneman defended the subsidies at a press conference, saying that they were within WTO limits and that the United States remained committed to lowering subsidies in the long run.
The summit opened with an appeal by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan for leaders to make good on their promises in 1996, at the first food summit, to reduce the number of people without enough to eat from 800 million to 400 million by 2015.