A communiqué agreed by ministers from 64 countries underscored the importance of tackling food waste and improving environmental sustainability in the run-up to the Rio+20 conference on sustainable development. The conference is due to be held in June of this year, twenty years after the original Earth Summit in the Brazilian city (see Bridges Weekly, 11 January 2012).

The new declaration, issued this weekend at the conclusion of the fourth Berlin Agriculture Ministers’ Summit, called on the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) to “draw up concepts for reducing the loss and waste of food,” and to co-operate with governments and other actors to implement such policies.

Ministers from Brazil, France, Germany, Indonesia, Japan, and the UK were among those present at the high-level gathering, which also included some three dozen developing countries.

Hunger and malnutrition

Farm ministers also stated their “commitment to renewed efforts to eliminate hunger and malnutrition,” although they did not further specify how they would achieve this goal.

While economic growth in some Asian countries has spurred rapid progress towards Millennium Development Goal targets - as well as more ambitious milestones from the 1996 World Food Summit - high and volatile food prices have recently exacerbated difficulties in achieving such targets in sub-Saharan Africa and other regions (see Bridges Weekly, 9 March 2011).

One government official involved in organising the event told Bridges that it was inevitable that such a large gathering would only be able to generate a “watered-down” communique that was limited to agreement on general principles.

“The more ministries and governments you gather, it’s usually like this,” he said.

However, another claimed that the outcomes of the conference were “very concrete,” giving as an example the ministers’ stated commitment “to the promotion and protection of the rights of women.” The official nonetheless observed that discussing any of these statements in detail at the conference was not possible, given the large number of countries present.

Some observers argued that the Berlin summit represented a political opportunity for agriculture ministers to underscore the importance of farming and food security ahead of the sustainable development summit this June - still seen in many circles as primarily the preserve of environment ministers. “Politically, it’s saying ‘we are important as well, agriculture and food security are important’ pre-Rio+20,” said Marita Wiggerthale, agricultural expert at Oxfam Germany.

da Silva: new paradigm needed

The FAO’s Director-General, José Graziano da Silva, said that a new agricultural paradigm was needed - “one that allows us to increase yields while using fewer resources.”

Countries need to shift away from the current model, based on intensive use of natural resources and inputs, he said in a keynote speech delivered at the event.

“About 80 percent of the increase in food production that is needed to eliminate hunger and feed a growing world population will have to come from increases in yields and cropping intensity in developing countries,” said da Silva, who took office three weeks ago.

The conference communiqué stressed that “increases in agricultural production must be made in a sustainable way,” although again did not specify how governments will ensure this result.

Consumption and waste

German farm minister Ilse Aigner, who hosted the event, cautioned that policymakers needed to tackle both unsustainable consumption patterns as well as problems with production.

“Every single consumer bears a great responsibility in respect of food because food wastage brings additional pressure to bear on resources such as energy, soil and water,” Aigner said.

Her remarks were echoed by da Silva, who noted that “roughly one-third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year - approximately 1.3 billion tonnes - gets lost or wasted.”

The FAO chief told participants that rich country consumers waste “almost as much food - 222 million tonnes - as the entire net food production of sub-Saharan Africa - 230 million tonnes.”

Access to food

da Silva also argued that poverty, and not a lack of available food, was the fundamental cause of hunger. “People are hungry not because there is not enough food available but because they do not have the money to buy food,” he said.

The new director-general previously served as Brazil’s minister of food security, where he oversaw the country’s ‘zero hunger’ programme credited for lifting 28 million people out of extreme poverty.

“We cannot ask them to wait for the structural changes to happen, we need to provide immediate assistance while we work on those changes,” da Silva said. He instead recommended that policy-makers explore “cash for work and cash transfer programmes” to stimulate growth in local markets - tools that had formed the cornerstone of Brazil’s own food security strategy in recent years.

Trade: subsidies and tariffs spark debate

In comments at a press conference in the margins of the summit, Aigner told reporters that she opposed “all subsidies for exports.” She added that export subsidies “have no role in agriculture in this day and age”.

Trade-distorting support in the developed world has traditionally been a contentious issue with trading partners, who have argued that it provides an unfair competitive advantage to producers in subsidising countries, to the detriment of their counterparts elsewhere.

However, Indonesian agriculture minister Asyraf Suswono replied that it was also important for developed countries to refrain from protecting their markets from developing country farm exports. “Too much protectionism makes it difficult for emerging developing countries to find markets for agriculture products,” Suswono said.

While the EU has substantially reduced the level of trade-distorting agricultural subsidies it provides its farmers, it continues to maintain relatively high tariffs on some farm products, whilst also providing preferential access to goods from many poor countries.

However, in stark contrast to the previous year’s summit, trade was almost completely absent from the final communiqué (see Bridges Weekly, 26 January 2011).

“It was deliberately chosen not to have trade as a part,” said one official who had been involved in organising the event. Another told Bridges that “you cannot discuss every topic every year.”

As food prices nudged record heights, last year’s event had focused extensively on agricultural trade and food price volatility, with the French government highlighting these issues under its presidency of the G-20 group of major economies.

Food security first

However, some observers expressed concern that, should prices now come down this year from their unusually high peaks, leaders’ interest in global food security could fall too. “That’s precisely what happened in 1973 and ‘74,” observed Stefan Tangermann, emeritus professor at the University of Goettingen in Germany, and a former head of trade and agriculture at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris.

“I’m afraid the same might happen again,” Tangermann told Bridges.

Others argued that a fresh approach to trade and food security was needed. Sophia Murphy, senior advisor to the Washington-based Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP), argued that “there has been a big loss of confidence in international markets, and we need both to remove some distortions and probably to put some others back to proceed.”

“The point is to allow trade to be a tool again, situated in food security strategies rather than claiming to be sufficient for economic growth and development,” Murphy said.

ICTSD reporting.

The items agreed upon at last week’s 30 November meeting of the WTO General Council will form the first part of the chair’s statement at the ministerial conference, with the second part - a summary of the issues that ministers raise at the event - to be determined at the event itself.

For more details on the draft decisions and elements of political guidance, see last week’s lead story in Bridges.

The food security proposals, one led by the EU and the other by Egypt, varied in scope but aimed to address export restrictions that have been faulted for driving up the price of food. Record food prices this year and in the past have been blamed for increasing hunger in developing countries.

While the food security proposals were some of the more talked-about ideas not to make the cut, sources note that various other proposals tabled in the consultations leading up to the 30 November General Council meeting also failed to make it into the political guidance document.

In many cases, trade sources explained, this was either due to the lack of time for discussing the proposals thoroughly, or because the issues under consideration were not well enough understood.

Although there might be an appetite for a food security agenda at the global trade body, “it seems that people have become quite firm. They’re committed to the political guidance document and don’t want to open it up for discussion” one source said.

Proposals different, yet similarly excluded

Building on a series of political decisions by the Group of 20 leading economies - not to be confused by the developing country grouping of the same name at the WTO - the EU formally proposed this past Wednesday that WTO members also agree not to restrict access to World Food Programme (WFP) purchases.

However, the EU’s proposal - which had 14 co-sponsors, including some G-20 members - failed to find consensus among the broader membership.

Some countries that were unconvinced by the EU proposal said that bringing G-20 language into the WTO would “open the door” for other issues discussed in the G-20 context to be brought into the global trade body.

Similar concerns had also been raised about the language that was eventually included in the political guidance document regarding protectionism. In consultations leading up to the General Council meeting, some countries had questioned whether transposing language used at a political forum like the G-20 to the WTO might set a bad precedent, given the legally binding nature of WTO commitments.

However, one delegate that supported the EU proposal rebuffed these concerns, stating that “we know that the G-20 is not a directorate or steering board for the WTO.”

Those co-ordinating the EU proposal had reportedly been discouraged from submitting the paragraph to a formal process within the Committee on Agriculture, given the apprehension that some members have toward new legal commitments, real or perceived.

Considering that last Wednesday’s meeting of the General Council was the first formal opportunity for comment on the EU proposal, some criticised the EU for imposing language without an opportunity to modify it.

Meanwhile, Egypt - working with the African, Arab and Net Food Importing Developing Countries (NFIDC) Groups - had tabled its own proposal for addressing food price volatility in Least Developed Countries and NFIDCs. This latter proposal included limits on export restrictions and increases in trade finance.

The proposal grew out of a text tabled earlier this year by Egypt and NFIDCs as part of the Doha Round negotiations. This earlier iteration carved out a specific exemption for NFIDCs and LDCs from export bans.

The most recent version of the proposal, circulated on 25 November in its final form, called for a work programme under the aegis of the General Council to discuss this issue and others, such as trade finance, that contribute to price volatility and food insecurity.

Geneva-based trade officials indicated that, while no single member explicitly blocked the inclusion of either proposal in the final document on political guidance, doubts raised by some members made consensus difficult to achieve.

The days ahead

Those close to both proposals indicated a willingness to press their case at the Ministerial Conference next week; others suggested broad support for a food security agenda at the WTO.

Barring inclusion in the consensus half of the chair’s statement, ministers may still express their support for either proposal or a food security agenda in their independent statements next week. This would allow for their positions to be written up in the second half of the chair’s statement.

Even if WTO members could agree on a food security agenda, a delegate added that it was “difficult to imagine that we could have progress on food security without having progress on the Doha Development Agenda.”

The ten-year Doha negotiations have faced repeated difficulties in recent years, with the political guidance document on 30 November officially acknowledging the impasse in the trade talks.

In the absence of ongoing negotiations, delegates at the WTO have been occupied with templates for scheduling commitments and notifications of domestic support, among other routine tasks. The WTO may need to “survive on procedural activities” according to one official.  “It’s not all sad,” he added.

ICTSD reporting.

Several proposals were amended in a last-minute bid to find wording that all members could accept, trade officials said. In order to take on trade partners’ concerns, the coalition of net-food importing developing countries (NFIDCs) also modified its draft decision on a work programme on food security challenges that both NFIDCs and least developed countries (LDCs) face, sources said (see Bridges Weekly, 2 November 2011).

“Everything has been watered down from our starting point,” one developing country negotiator observed.

Meanwhile, West African cotton producing countries had been obliged substantially to modify another proposal for a freeze on cotton subsidy spending at current, historically-low levels. Instead of debating the cotton producers’ earlier proposal, trade ministers were now expected only to reiterate the commitment to address cotton “ambitiously, expeditiously and specifically” that members agreed at the WTO’s Hong Kong ministerial conference in 2005, trade sources said.

The US has resisted moves to impose restrictions on their domestic support for cotton in the absence of other measures targeting payments for producers in large developing countries, such as China and India, trade sources said.

“There isn’t very much progress in this regard,” admitted one negotiator who was familiar with the issue.

Food aid: export restrictions

A separate proposal on humanitarian food aid was also slated for discussion at the Wednesday meeting: tabled by the EU and a group of both developed and developing countries, the draft decision would exempt humanitarian food aid purchases by the UN’s World Food Programme from export restrictions imposed by WTO members (see Bridges Weekly, 2 November 2011).

The text would have all WTO members adopt the language of an agreement reached by G-20 agriculture ministers at their Paris summit in June, which was reaffirmed at the beginning of November by heads of state in Cannes. However, not all G-20 countries co-sponsored the EU proposal at the WTO, in a sign of underlying divergences amongst the countries’ trade ministries.

In comments to Bridges, some smaller countries also expressed concern that they had been dissuaded from making further changes to the language agreed amongst the G-20. “They were not willing to change a comma,” one source claimed.

Food deficit countries: work programme?

The group of NFIDCs, and their African and Arab Group co-sponsors, had further modified a proposal for a work programme on the challenges that NFIDCs and LDCs face, sources said. A revised version of the text omitted the previous mention of the need to ensure that NFIDCs and LDCs can access adequate supplies of basic foodstuffs, and modified two other elements of the draft that had sparked comment from other countries.

Under the new proposal, trade ministers would agree to “direct the General Council to develop a comprehensive, fact-based, result-oriented and time-bound work program” to examine how to mitigate the impact of food price volatility on LDCs and NFIDCs.

According to a draft seen by Bridges, the elements of the work programme would be agreed by members, but could include developing new rules that would ensure that LDC and NFIDC government-authorised food purchases would be exempted from quantitative export restrictions imposed under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) Article XI.2(a) by major agricultural exporters.

The text also proposes that the work programme could explore, “in co-ordination with competent institutions,” concessional financing mechanisms to address short-term difficulties in financing food imports. A number of countries had objected to a clause in a previous proposal anticipating that a revolving fund could be set up to do so at the WTO, arguing instead that other international institutions were better suited to provide this support than the global trade body.

In an attempt to accommodate the concerns of other countries which argued that they faced similar challenges, despite not belonging to the NFIDC or LDC groups, the revised proposal anticipates that the work programme will also address those challenges encountered by other vulnerable developing countries facing critical situations of food insecurity. The work programme would be pursued under the auspices of the WTO Committee on Agriculture, sources said.

Political guidance

Issues that have not been included on the General Council’s agenda, or in the draft ‘political guidance’ that ministers will provide to the WTO, could still be reflected in stand-alone decisions or declarations, trade sources said. (For more on the political guidance elements, see the lead story in this issue.)

As Bridges went to press, delegates were working toward reaching agreement on a draft political guidance document for ministers to approve, and which is expected to form one part of a ‘chair’s summary’ alongside other issues that are raised in the discussions among ministers.

While members have been scrambling to reach consensus on outstanding issues, “the political guidance text isn’t the be-all and end-all,” one negotiator pointed out.

However, members now have only a few days left to finalise agreement before ministers arrive in Geneva in a fortnight’s time.
ICTSD reporting.

“The EU has initiated anti-subsidy and anti-dumping investigations into imports of bioethanol from the USA to establish if US imports of bioethanol have an adverse effect on the European bioethanol industry,” EU trade spokesman John Clancy said in a statement.

According to sources in Brussels, the case has been in the works for a long time. Most analysts there believe that sufficient evidence will be found to justify the imposition of countervailing duties.

In its original complaint, ePure - also known as the European Producers Union of Renewable Energy Association - alleged that US tax credits allowed American exporters to cut their EU selling price by about 40 percent, thereby illegally dumping into the EU market.

The industry association also claimed that this led to a 500 percent rise in US exports to the EU between 2008 and 2010. ePure expects that these imports will, in 2011 alone, have doubled from their 2010 levels.

“This impressive trend is the direct result of US federal and sub federal subsidies, which allow US operators to adopt aggressive pricing practices on the European market,” the industry group argued.

While the ethanol aid is set to expire at the end of this year, US import share is expected to rise even further as the 27-member EU bloc faces higher production costs and production shortfalls.

ePure, whose members produce 80 percent of Europe’s bioethanol, explained in their statement that the subsidisation policy has allowed the US to become the world’s largest ethanol producer. The unfairly low prices that the producers can adopt as a consequence have had a direct and negative impact on the EU industry, the association argued.

US industry group strikes back

The ePure claims led to a strong rejection from its US counterpart, the US Renewable Fuels Association (RFA). “RFA has neither discovered nor been provided any evidence by the EU that such ethanol trades are occurring,” the group said in a 2 November statement.

The US group further argued that the EU complaint was misguided, since “domestic ethanol producers are not eligible for the tax incentive referenced by the Europeans.”

RFA added that the “tax incentive is specifically made available to gasoline blenders, marketers and other end users. Therefore, US ethanol producers cannot nor should be the focus of any European action.”

Nonetheless, the US industry group responded to the EU ethanol investigation by guaranteeing co-operation between US producers and the EU - an important requirement under the WTO anti-dumping agreement.

This requirement means to ensure that responding exporters - in this case, US manufacturers - cannot keep investigations hostage by refusing to submit relevant information for the investigations. Otherwise, the investigating authorities may have to rely on incomplete information, which could work to the disadvantage of the exporters.

Brazil, a main ethanol producer and exporter, is expected to welcome the move, sources told Bridges. Lately the South American country has lost much of its EU market-share to the powerful US industry.

The European Commission’s announcement comes at a time where the EU has repeatedly found itself under fire for its biofuels import policy. The EU Renewable Energy Directive, in particular the incorporated sustainability standards, are considered discriminatory and unfair by a number of biofuel-producing countries.

These standards qualify which biofuels may be considered “sustainable,” taking into account greenhouse gas emission savings and biodiversity conservation achievements. Only the sustainable fuels are considered renewable energy, making them eligible for certain financial support by EU member states.

Countries’ individual threshold commitments for the overall share of renewable energy that has to come from renewable sources- the highest being 49 percent in Sweden - also provide a strong incentive to only use sustainable biofuels. Moreover, for some biofuels imported from outside the EU, the Commission has not provided a default value, putting them at a disadvantage with EU produced like-products.

Further analysis of the EU Renewable Energy Directive is available in this 2010 ICTSD information note. ICTSD is the publisher of Bridges Weekly.

Next steps

The European Commission now has 15 months to address the complaint of “material injury” to European producers. Provisional findings are due by 24 August 2012.

According to WTO rules, after a preliminary determination deems that the imports are causing an injury and that countermeasures would be necessary to prevent further damage during the course of the investigations, provisional anti-dumping and countervailing duties can be applied for six and four months, respectively.

The investigation could result in the imposition of five-year taxes on US bioethanol producers. Back in 2008, the EU imposed five-year duties on imports of biodiesel from the US; in the following year, Brussels extended these duties to Canada.

ICTSD reporting; “EU Opens Dumping, Anti-Subsidy Probes into U.S. Bioethanol,” BUSINESSWEEK, 29 November 2011; “EU opens investigation into U.S. bioethanol subsidies,” REUTERS, 25 November 2011.

The report, released by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) on 28 November, found that many of the countries that will need to produce food for feeding this population are, consequently, the countries facing the most land degradation.

About 40 percent of degraded lands lie in regions with high poverty rates, where small-scale farmers must pay the price for unsuitable land. “The distribution of land and water resources does not favour those countries that need to produce more in the future,” the report states.

The report also warns that many agricultural systems face “the risk of progressive breakdown of their productive capacity under a combination of excessive demographic pressure and unsustainable agriculture use and practices.”

These pressures have already led to the beginnings of a degradation process - with the report estimating that 25 percent of the earth’s lands are degraded; 1.6 billion hectares of land are currently used to grow crops. With these lands suffering a large toll, governments and organisations will have to find ways to incentivise sustainable agricultural procedures, the UN agency noted.

Resource degradation could increase inequality

Some farming practices may have contributed to processes of erosion, nutrient loss, topsoil compaction, salinisation and pollution. Although governments have tried to help farmers produce in a ‘greener’ fashion, the report argues that many of these policies benefit large-scale famers who have unfair access to resources.

This leaves many small-scale farmers to suffer from resource degradation, despite the fact that many of these farmers come from the growing nations that will need to produce more in the future.

Almost one billion people are undernourished, mostly in Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, meaning that global production of food will need to rise faster than population growth to reverse the consequences of poor food policy. However, the report states that much of the farming land already in use will have to sustain future production in coming years.

Since 1960, the expansion in area of land use for crop cultivation has been only 12 percent, while world agricultural activity has increased between 150 and 200 percent - illustrating the intensified pressure on the same land to increasingly produce more.

Upon the report’s publication, FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf stressed that steps to address these stresses facing agricultural production systems must be taken immediately. “The consequences in terms of hunger and poverty are unacceptable,” he said.

Recommendations

Increased efficiency of water use and innovative farming practices will be key to providing sustainable crop production for the coming years. Hubert George, Technical Officer for Land and Environment Information Systems at the FAO, commented in an interview that building awareness and making green initiatives profitable for farmers - through easier access to technology and carbon trading, and payments for environmental services - were possible strategies for tackling the major issues.

The report also highlighted the need for an improved and more transparent trade policy that would, in turn, encourage sustainable agriculture by offering incentives to those who do not harmfully exploit land.

Policies must also focus on securing market access for small scale farmers and those using ‘green’ farming practices, the FAO noted.

ICTSD reporting; “Land, water scarcity threaten food security - UN,” REUTERS, 28 November 2011.

The new figure is due to represent a record high, as well as a record increase, the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said at a 17 November session of the WTO’s Committee on Agriculture devoted to discussing the situation of poor food-deficit countries.

Spending on grain-based products and vegetable oils accounted for over one-third of the entire cost of importing food this year, the agency said in a paper (G/AG/GEN/98) submitted ahead of the meeting. However, import costs had also risen by 23 percent for sugar and beverages, and by an average of 19 percent for livestock products (including both meat and dairy).

The agency’s assessment was echoed by the World Bank, which said its commodity price index had been stable since March 2011, but at a higher level than its previous peak.

Higher prices, and not greater volumes of trade, were behind the import bills’ increase, the FAO said - pointing out that the amount of sugar traded had even declined during the year.

However, low and stable international freight costs for much of the year had helped contain price increases, the agency said. Higher domestic production and the downgrading of economic growth in several important markets had also played a role.

Marrakesh Decision

The agencies’ analysis was presented at a meeting to review follow-up actions to the Marrakesh Ministerial Decision - an accord that was struck at the end of the Uruguay Round of trade talks. The Marrakesh Decision was aimed at preventing agricultural trade reforms from undermining food security in the least developed and net food-importing developing countries (known as LDCs and NFIDCs in the WTO’s jargon).

The decision aimed to ensure that trade liberalisation did not lead to adverse effects in poor food-importing countries, and included clauses on food aid, agricultural productivity and financing arrangements. However, food-deficit developing countries have complained for years that the decision has not been implemented effectively.

This year’s discussion took place against the backdrop of preparations for the 15-17 December WTO Ministerial Conference - and a communication (see Bridges Weekly, 2 November 2011) from the NFIDCs calling for ministers to agree upon a work programme to address the specific food security challenges that they and the LDCs now face.

The draft text calls for a comprehensive work programme to ensure that NFIDCs and LDCs can access adequate supplies of basic foodstuffs; to “explore the possibility” of developing rules to exempt countries in these two groups from export restrictions imposed by other WTO members that are major exporters of these foodstuffs; and to help NFIDCs and LDCs access trade financing on concessional terms, possibly through a fund that would be set up for this purpose.

The work programme proposal was debated on 16 November in an informal session of the agriculture committee specially convened for the purpose. Trade sources told Bridges that while members seemed broadly to share the view that a work programme was desirable, they disagreed on its scope and focus.

Some members argued that the focus of any such work programme ought to include other countries with food security concerns, but which did not fall into the existing categories of net food-importing countries or least developed countries. Indonesia and Nigeria were reportedly amongst the countries expressing this view.

A number of countries in the Cairns Group of agricultural exporters emphasised that it was important to consider the range of trade policies that can affect food security - including market access measures and trade-distorting subsidies - in addition to the question of agricultural export restrictions that the NFIDCs had raised.

Argentina had a particularly strong reaction to the World Bank’s advice that, “to minimise the impact of future food price spikes, clear commitments to avoiding the use of export restrictions on food will be needed.” Argentina, a Cairns member and major agricultural exporter, has historically applied export restrictions, ostensibly to raise government revenue and promote value addition in the agricultural sector.

Some countries, such as Bolivia and Venezuela, reportedly cautioned that they may find it difficult to accept disciplines affecting their ability to impose export restrictions, due to clauses in their national constitutions that enshrine an obligation to guarantee food for their populations.

Other WTO members took issue with the NFIDC’s proposal to consider setting up a fund to provide concessional financing to countries facing difficulties in paying for imports of basic foodstuffs. Similar proposals had been discussed extensively in recent years, without bearing any fruit, some members noted; meanwhile, others argued that other global bodies were better suited to providing financing of this nature.

Trade sources told Bridges that the proposal was now expected to be considered at the General Council, due to meet informally tomorrow, 24 November, and in a formal session next week on 30 November and 1 December.

Trade negotiations: no consensus on cotton

At a separate meeting of the ‘special session’ of the committee on agriculture last Friday, WTO members formally elected New Zealand ambassador John Adank as the new committee chair, who reported back to them on consultations he had held recently on cotton.

The so-called ‘C-4′ group of West African cotton producers - Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Mali - had recently submitted a new proposal (see Bridges Weekly, 16 November 2011) for a ministerial decision, calling for a freeze on current cotton subsidy spending, amongst other things. However, Adank told members that no consensus had been reached, just one day ahead of a deadline for proposing to the General Council items for inclusion on the WTO ministerial agenda.

C-4 countries have consistently been frustrated in their attempts to pursue cuts to US cotton subsidies, which Washington has variously linked to progress on Doha Round agriculture negotiations more generally, the upcoming domestic Farm Bill process, and the subsidies of larger developing countries such as China and India. Some African countries speaking at the meeting argued that the onus was still on the US to produce a counter-proposal responding to C-4 demands in this area.

Trade delegates told Bridges that they expected to have a clearer idea of the agenda for the ministerial conference following next week’s General Council meeting.

More information

Analysis by the FAO (G/AG/GEN/98 and G/AG/GEN/98/Corr.1) and World Bank (G/AG/GEN/96) is available online at docsonline.wto.org.

ICTSD reporting.

In a statement calling off the rush to a compromise, the six-member Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, better known as the Super Committee, expressed hope that Congress would continue to build on its work to rein in government outlays.

Congressional agriculture committees had earlier committed to US$23 billion cuts in the five year 2012 Farm Bill period. The omnibus legislation is projected to cost US$480 billion over the same period, with funds going primarily towards the food stamp programme.

Under the now defunct farm bill negotiations, US$15 billion in cuts would come from programmes subsidising or insuring particular crops and US$8 billion from conservation and nutritional programmes.

Although a proposal from the Senate farm committee to the Super Committee was leaked on Friday, the final output of weeks of work is not likely to be disclosed immediately.

Next steps uncertain in ‘highly politicised’ environment

The bipartisan Super Committee was tasked with shaving US$1.2 trillion over a 10 year period out of an estimated $40 trillion federal budget. Its failure to reach a compromise will likely mean US$1.5 trillion in automatic across the board cuts - affecting politically sensitive programmes such as national defence, Social Security, and Medicare.

In farm spending, food stamps and conservation would be the only programmes spared from the automatic cuts. Analysts at the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC), citing US Congressional Budget Office calculations, expected US$15.6 billion to be culled largely from crop and revenue insurance programmes under the automatic cuts.

The NASC is a Washington-based alliance of grassroots organisations that advocate for federal policy reform to advance the sustainability of agriculture and natural resources.

In recent weeks, many observers conceded the inevitability of reduced direct payments in exchange for a strengthened crop and revenue insurance programme that would make for up to 90 to 95 percent of losses on commodity crops. Ferd Hoefner of NSAC told Bridges that direct payments were now in “the dustbin of history.”

The process for updating the Farm Bill still remains murky, with Hoefner commenting that “nobody knows” where it might be headed. Observers in Washington suggested several possibilities - a farm bill written in 2013, with an extension of the current legislation passed to hold farmers over; a bill written and passed in 2012 through the usual process; or a bill reached through an alternative compromise on the deficit.

Long-time farm bill watchers emphasised the fragility of the upcoming process. An agricultural economist at Ohio State University, Carl Zulauf, whose specialties include the current crop revenue (ACRE) programme, told Bridges that many variables - including crop prices - would drive the time, place, and nature of discussion around the next farm bill.

Presidential politics and the importance of early primaries in farm states, such as Iowa, may also set the tone for the year. Charlotte Hebebrand of the Washington-based International Agricultural Trade Policy Council told Bridges that, while the failure of the Super Committee might be a good thing by leading to increased transparency in the farm bill talks, it would still be a more difficult process since a consensus view “exists less and less,” she said.

Projections of uncertainty might be well-rewarded. Ambassador Clayton Yeutter, who was the US Secretary of Agriculture during the late 1980s and early 1990s, told Bridges nearly three weeks ago that there was “no way they can produce a completed product this year.”

Citing a “highly politicised” environment, he noted the likelihood of a 2013 Farm Bill where sugar and dairy do well, “as always,” and that includes a strengthened crop insurance programme. Predicting that those with the greatest political influence would emerge with the “fewest policy/financial scars” he added that traditional crop subsidies would likely be “reduced substantially.”

WTO and development a marginal consideration, experts say

In the view of Congressional agriculture committees, farm bills are written “in Washington, DC and not in Geneva,” said Yeutter. Others observed a complete absence of WTO rules from the Congressional negotiating process. Hoefner told Bridges that the attitude of those writing the farm legislation in recent weeks towards the WTO was “so what!”

The possibility of the US eliminating direct payments and shifting towards ‘amber’ box, or more trade-distorting support, is an area of concern for some WTO members, as the US Congress might be quietly aware. At an event last week, Joe Glaubber, the US Department of Agriculture’s Chief Economist, told a Johns Hopkins audience that Congressional staffers had been regularly consulting with his office on the size and nature of farm payments that would be allowed under WTO rules.

In the absence of a final Doha Round agreement, US spending must remain under the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture limits. Hebebrand argued that the limits would not be the “first consideration” for US lawmakers; even so, adhering to those limits would still leave lawmakers “a lot of leg room.”

Reaction from a Geneva-based developed country agriculture delegate was muted, with officials in Geneva occupied with the upcoming WTO ministerial conference. Commenting on the proposals circulated thus far, “reductions in farm spending,” he said “don’t always lead to a more trade-friendly policy. “When you cut in one place you have to increase payments elsewhere,” he added.

Some development organisations in DC have been critical of the thus-far closed farm bill process. Eric Muñoz of Oxfam noted a particular lack of concern for developing the country’s small holders. The US Congress, he argued, has “abdicated responsibility for a farm bill that is responsive to the interests of people that are affected by our farm policy.”

ICTSD reporting.

Le défi

Nous avançons les yeux fermés vers une catastrophe mondiale, consécutive à l’effondrement du système alimentaire actuel. Celui-ci est en train de s’écrouler sous la pression conjuguée du changement climatique, de la dégradation écologique, de la croissance démographique, de l’augmentation du prix de l’énergie, de la demande croissante de viande et produits laitiers et de l’emprise croissante des biocarburants, de l’industrie et de l’urbanisation sur les terres agricoles. En conséquence, les prix des denrées alimentaires devraient plus que doubler d’ici 2030. Rendements qui plafonnent et épuisement des ressources naturelles signifient qu’il sera de plus en plus difficile de répondre à une demande alimentaire croissante. Les inégalités iront en s’accentuant à mesure que la raréfaction des ressources naturelles se fera plus grande. Les populations ne bénéficiant pas des revenus, de l’épargne ou de la protection sociale existants dans les pays industrialisés seront les premières à souffrir de la fragilité persistante du système alimentaire et aux chocs externes.

Cette catastrophe pourrait pourtant être évitée si les gouvernements prenaient des mesures d’urgence pour reforger notre système alimentaire mondial. Trois grands changements sont en effet nécessaires. En premier lieu, les dirigeants internationaux doivent s’accorder sur une nouvelle gouvernance mondiale qui serait à même d’éviter les crises alimentaires, de promouvoir la sécurité alimentaire et d’inverser les politiques néfastes qui ne font qu’aggraver la situation. Deuxièmement, les investissements doivent être dirigés vers les petits producteurs alimentaires, afin d’améliorer la productivité, de réduire la pauvreté et d’accroitre la résistance aux chocs dans les pays en développement. Enfin et surtout, un accord équitable sur le changement climatique, prévoyant un soutien pour que les pays en développement puissent s’adapter à celui-ci, ouvrira la voie à un avenir plus durable et plus écologique.

Le présent article se concentre principalement sur les réformes nécessaires dans le domaine des politiques commerciales agricoles, et notamment en matière d’amélioration de la gouvernance internationale, afin d’offrir au Monde un futur alimentaire plus sûr.

La réforme des politiques commerciales agricoles

Les règles commerciales restent injustes et largement dominées par les intérêts propres à chaque pays. Les grands intervenants tels que l’Europe devraient veiller à ce que leurs politiques commerciales ne compromettent pas le droit des pays pauvres à réglementer leur propre économie. Les accords de libre-échange entre pays développés et pays en développement doivent notamment respecter le droit de se nourrir. Il est indispensable que les pays en développement conservent la possibilité de faire usage des droits de douane et des autres outils de politique commerciale pour protéger les marchés locaux et les petits producteurs alimentaires de la concurrence déloyale et ruineuse des produits agricoles subventionnés à l’excès arrivant de l’UE et d’autres pays riches.  En outre, en réponse aux fluctuations récentes des prix des denrées alimentaires, des mesures prises dans la panique ne font qu’aggraver la situation.

Les restrictions à l’exportation alimentent l’inflation des prix alimentaires

Au plus fort de la crise alimentaire de 2008, les grands producteurs alimentaires ont eu recours à des restrictions d’exportation sur certains produits de base essentiels comme le blé (la Russie) ou le riz (l’Inde), avec pour conséquence une accélération de l’envolée des prix. Les règles mondiales en vigueurs sur les restrictions à l’exportation de denrées alimentaires devraient être revues pour éviter un effet domino de mesures restrictives. Les achats publics visant à constituer des stocks sont un autre exemple de mesures prises dans la panique, et ne font qu’aggraver la hausse des prix sur les marchés des denrées alimentaires. Bien que les restrictions quantitatives soient interdites au titre de l’Accord général sur les tarifs douaniers et le commerce (GATT) de l’Organisation mondiale du commerce (OMC), elles sont en pratique souvent formulées de façon assez vague, et des dispositions dérogatoires, dont la validité est douteuse, permettent aux pays de les appliquer à leur gré. L’amélioration des règles commerciales internationales prendra du temps, mais les principaux exportateurs de produits alimentaires devraient s’engager publiquement à s’abstenir de toute interdiction soudaine des exportations, et surtout à ne pas soumettre l’aide humanitaire à de telles interdictions.

Insécurité alimentaire : le rôle aggravant des subventions agricoles

Bien que les subventions agricoles des pays du nord existent depuis longtemps, ce n’est que plus récemment qu’elles ont été présentées comme une manière de répondre aux défis mondiaux de la production alimentaire. Revêtir les subventions agricoles de l’habit de la sécurité alimentaire est néanmoins ni plus ni moins qu’une mascarade. Les produits alimentaires doivent être produits directement dans les pays en développement, là où domine l’insécurité alimentaire, et la production doit être assurée par les petites exploitations agricoles familiales.

Lorsque les subventions agricoles faussent les échanges commerciaux, en restreignant l’accès aux marchés ou en encourageant la surproduction et le dumping, elles viennent directement compromettre le développement d’un secteur agricole résilient dans les pays pauvres. Les petits agriculteurs des pays pauvres se sont vus progressivement éjectés hors de leur propre marché par l’importation de produits alimentaires à des prix artificiellement bas, et désormais les populations de ces pays se trouvent de plus en plus exposées à la volatilité exacerbée des prix alimentaires. Pour empêcher les exportations subventionnées de venir concurrencer la production agricole locale des pays pauvres, l’UE devrait s’efforcer d’éliminer ses subventions résiduelles à l’exportation, et les quotas devraient strictement refléter les besoins du marché européen afin d’éviter toute surproduction ou dumping. Les propositions actuelles de réforme de la politique agricole commune européenne pour 2013 ne satisfont pas ces impératifs.

Une nouvelle gouvernance internationale pour permettre la sécurité alimentaire

Les politiques commerciales agricoles ne constituent qu’un aspect des mesures nécessaire pour permettre à la sécurité alimentaire à l’échelle mondiale. La multiplicité des difficultés rencontrées par le système alimentaire mondial nécessite des réponses nouvelles et multiples. Le système international actuel, fragmenté, tributaire des circonstances, de faible légitimité et riche en lacunes et frictions entre gouvernements et institutions, n’est pas encore à la hauteur de la tâche pour coordonner et mettre en place une mondialisation plus équitable, résiliente, et plus durable. Trois réformes de la gouvernance internationale s’avèrent nécessaires :

En premier lieu, la mise en place d’un système de réserves alimentaires, au niveau local, national, régional et multilatéral, permettra de faire face aux situations de volatilité exacerbée des prix alimentaires. Elle restaurera également la confiance au sein du marché des matières premières et permettra de disposer de réserves alimentaires suffisantes en cas d’urgence. Pour répondre aux critiques qui ont été formulées, la capacité institutionnelle, la responsabilisation et la transparence de ces réserves alimentaires doivent être améliorées et une approche de gestion « dans le respect des règles » mise en œuvre.

Deuxièmement, les gouvernements devraient apporter un soutien financier et politique au Comité de l’ONU sur la sécurité alimentaire mondiale (CSA), pour en faire le principal forum de négociation des mesures en faveur de la sécurité alimentaire au plan international. Le CSA est le seul espace rassemblant l’ensemble des États, la société civile, les institutions internationales et le secteur privé. Cette approche permettrait aux différents gouvernements d’agir de façon concertée dans l’intérêt mondial, de réduire les risques, d’établir la confiance et au final, de sauver des vies.

Enfin, les politiques néfastes qui contribuent à la crise des prix alimentaires doivent être revues d’urgence. La spéculation excessive sur les biens agricoles dérivés doit être freinée au moyen de limites imposées sur les cours et les positions ainsi que par une plus grande transparence des marchés. L’Europe, en tant que place centrale de ces opérations, devrait profiter des processus à venir, tels que l’examen de la directive concernant les marchés d’instruments financiers, pour mettre en place un contrôle sur ces activités spéculatives dommageables. Dans le même esprit, les mandats de biocarburants dans les pays riches devraient être interdits, étant donné qu’il est désormais bien établi, y compris par des organismes internationaux, comme la Banque mondiale ou l’Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques (OCDE), qu’ils sont l’un des principaux facteurs de la volatilité des prix alimentaires.

Préparer l’avenir

Il est clair que tout progrès réalisé dans la lutte contre la faim sera inutile si rien n’est entrepris pour combattre le changement climatique. Des recherches effectuées pour Oxfam estiment que le changement climatique représenterait à lui seul la moitié du doublement du prix d’ici 2030 des principaux produits alimentaires de base, en raison des dégâts sur les récoltes et de la baisse des rendements qu’il induit. Dans le cadre d’une stratégie visant à assurer la sécurité alimentaire, les gouvernements doivent agir d’urgence pour réduire les émissions de gaz à effet de serre et aider les pays en développement, en débloquant les financements nécessaires à la mise en place de méthodes plus respectueuses du climat et à l’amélioration de la résistance au changement climatique, y compris au niveau des communautés de petits exploitants agricoles. Le monde doit se préparer à une situation dans laquelle les ressources se feront très probablement plus rares et plus volatiles.

Il reste une question essentielle : qui produira de façon durable les aliments nécessaires à une population toujours plus nombreuse, et comment y parvenir dans le respect des contraintes liées aux émissions carbone et à la raréfaction des ressources? Cette question a souvent conduit à des débats polarisés entre partisans d’une agriculture commerciale à grande échelle et défenseurs de l’autosuffisance à petite échelle. En matière d’agriculture, il ne s’agit pas de dire que « big is beautiful » ou au contraire que l’agriculture à grande échelle est forcément mauvaise. Mais l’exportation en Afrique du modèle d’agriculture à grande échelle tel qu’observé au Brésil combine mauvaise logique économique et ignorance des réalités sociales. En l’absence d’un volume sans précédent, et peu probable, de créations d’emplois dans les centres urbains, l’importation d’une seule exploitation à grande échelle du Brésil en Tanzanie pourrait faire disparaitre 12 500 petites exploitations, entraînant une propagation spectaculaire de la pauvreté, de la faim en milieu rural, et des bidonvilles en milieu urbain.

L’énorme potentiel inexploité de l’amélioration des rendements au niveau des petits exploitants agricoles représente une véritable opportunité. Les investissements au niveau des petits producteurs alimentaires, et notamment des femmes, permettraient d’accroitre les revenus et d’améliorer la disponibilité des denrées alimentaires dans les zones de famine, tout en améliorant la résilience de ces zones aux chocs futurs.

La crise alimentaire de 2008 a suscité un regain d’intérêt à l’égard des investissements agricoles de la part des bailleurs de fonds, des gouvernements nationaux et du secteur privé. Mais un véritable changement d’approche reste nécessaire concernant le niveau et la nature du soutien apporté, afin de garantir que les opportunités offertes par l’agriculture à petite échelle soient saisies, et que les cadres politiques nationaux et internationaux gouvernant les ressources foncières et naturelles génèrent des résultats sociaux et environnementaux.

Période de crise : une opportunité à saisir

Historiquement, les crises précèdent des changements systémiques. La crise actuelle constitue une occasion unique de transformer le système au moment où celui-ci est en train de s’effondrer. Que ce soit au sein des grands forums internationaux, ou dans leur propre pays, les gouvernements doivent mener les changements de fond nécessaires pour transformer un système alimentaire défaillant, et passer d’une ère de concurrence à celle d’une coopération renforcée dans la cadre de laquelle le bien-être du plus grand nombre passera avant les intérêts de quelques-uns. La crise de la corne de l’Afrique fait figure de rappel dramatique de la nécessité de prendre des mesures urgentes pour réparer un système alimentaire déficient et s’assurer que cette crise soit la dernière.

Auteurs :

Marc-Olivier Herman et Lies Craeynest sont conseillers politiques au sein du bureau de plaidoyer (Advocacy Office) d’Oxfam auprès de l’UE à Bruxelles, et travaillent sur la sécurité alimentaire et le changement climatique. Laetitia Tremel est chargée d’études au sein de ce même bureau.

Les défaillances du système alimentaire et les crises environnementales sont en train d’effacer des décennies de progrès contre la faim, selon une nouvelle analyse d’Oxfam. L’envolée des prix alimentaires et le cycle sans fin des crises alimentaires régionales seront à l’origine de millions de personnes mal nourries de plus, sauf si nous changeons la manière dont nous produisons et partageons nos aliments. Oxfam a lancé le 1er juin 2011 une nouvelle campagne mondiale appelée « CULTIVONS » (« GROW » en anglais) pour garantir que chacun ait toujours de quoi se nourrir.

Des informations supplémentaires sont disponibles dans le cadre de la campagne « CULTIVONS » d’Oxfam : http://www.oxfam.org/fr/cultivons

The Super Committee, formally known as the US Congress Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, is made up of twelve members equally split between House and Senate members, and Democrats and Republicans. The results of the negotiations will lead to an “up or down” vote on 23 December by both chambers (see Bridges Weekly 26 October 2011).

Farm bill legislators had proposed US$23 billion in cuts over a ten-year period in response to mounting pressure to rein in federal spending. The bulk of the cuts - US$15 billion - were expected to affect commodity programmes and direct payments in particular. The US notified the WTO of a total US$114 billion in farm subsidies for 2009 alone (see Bridges Weekly, 7 September 2011)

In recent weeks, farm lobby groups have failed to reach a compromise with their Congressional representatives on the precise makeup of these budget cuts. US agricultural payments slated for cuts support some crops better than others: rice farmers, for example, receive a greater subsidy per hectare than those growing corn. This disparity has pitted some agriculture groups against others in the budget process.

Some farm bill watchers in Washington are “not very optimistic” about the Super Committee process. If the Super Committee fails to reach a compromise before the 23 December vote, US$1.5 trillion in “automatic” cuts across the board, split evenly between defence and non-defence spending, could go into effect. Committees with oversight of federal spending, such as agriculture, have therefore been rushing to draft proposals in an attempt to control the direction, if not the scale, of cuts in their areas.

With direct payments politically unpopular and most likely to go, analysts such as Robert Thompson of Johns Hopkins University warn that a shift from minimally trade distorting WTO ‘green’ box spending towards restricted ‘amber’ box would be “one more blow in the credibility of the US in the multilateral process.”

A beefed-up crop insurance programme is expected by many observers of US agriculture policy. The programme would cover “shallow” loses and insure farmers for 90 to 95 percent of their revenue.

Changes in farm spending could hurt areas that need federal support the most. Cornell University’s Chris Barrett told Bridges that, although legislators may preserve spending on commodities, they will likely gut the research programmes that drive future productivity growth.

The task of preparing a farm bill remains difficult. To date nearly 20 proposals from legislators and major farm lobbies have been circulated in Washington.

ICTSD reporting; “Farm bill talks drag amid regional differences,” ARGUS LEADER, 1 November 2011.

Although agriculture ministers from the G-20 group of major economies agreed in June to remove food export restrictions or extraordinary taxes on humanitarian aid purchased by the UN World Food Programme, the same countries appear to have been unable to agree on proposals for adopting such language at the WTO (see Bridges Weekly, 29 June 2011 and 5 October 2011, respectively).

Agricultural export restrictions have been widely criticised for exacerbating price hikes and food shortages, penalising the poorest consumers in developing countries (see Bridges Weekly, 11 May 2011).

The EU has therefore tabled the proposal along with various other G-20 countries, but without the support of Argentina, Brazil, China, India and South Africa, who have opposed the move, and also without the US, which is believed to favour more far-reaching disciplines on export restrictions.

Although they are not G-20 members, Costa Rica, Singapore, and Switzerland have also reportedly joined the EU as co-sponsors of the proposal.

According to a draft of the proposal seen by Bridges, the supporters propose that all WTO members adopt text stating that they “agree to remove food export restrictions or extraordinary taxes for food purchased for non-commercial humanitarian purposes by the World Food Programme (WFP) and we agree not to impose them in the future” - the same wording that was agreed upon by G-20 agriculture ministers this summer.

India is believed to have circulated alternative text stating simply that WTO members ‘take note’ of the G-20 farm ministers’ statement.

While a WTO ministerial declaration would not be legally binding, it could, in theory, be taken into consideration by a dispute settlement panel. However, trade officials have questioned whether WTO members would in fact be likely ever to bring disputes on this issue (see Bridges Weekly, 5 October 2011).

It remains unclear whether the G-20 summit in Cannes will endorse the agriculture ministers’ action plan, given the continued divergence on the issue within the group (see related article in this issue). Russia, which is still officially in the process of joining the WTO, has also tended to resist measures that might restrict its ability to impose agricultural export restrictions.

A WTO work programme on trade and food security?

A group of net food-importing developing countries (NFIDCs) have also submitted a proposal for ministers to consider in December, calling for a work programme to mitigate the impact of food price volatility on least developed countries (LDCs) and NFIDCs.

The draft text calls for a comprehensive work programme to ensure that NFIDCs and LDCs can access adequate supplies of basic foodstuffs; to “explore the possibility” of developing rules to exempt countries in these two groups from export restrictions imposed by other WTO members that are major exporters of these foodstuffs; and to help NFIDCs and LDCs access trade financing on concessional terms, possibly through a fund that would be set up for this purpose.

An earlier paper tabled by the NFIDC group as part of the Doha trade negotiations sought more extensive disciplines on agricultural export restrictions at the WTO (see Bridges Weekly, 6 April 2011). The proposal would have expressly forbidden the imposition of export restrictions, along with prohibitions on exports to NFIDCs or LDCs from other countries.

Trade sources familiar with the proposal said that the new text was focused more specifically on restrictions imposed by major food exporters, in a bid to foster consensus more broadly across the WTO membership.

Consultations on both proposals are likely to continue ahead of the next meeting of the WTO’s General Council, trade sources said. The General Council is the organisation’s highest decision-making body outside of the ministerial conferences, and is next scheduled to meet on 1-2 December.

ICTSD reporting.