THE KOREA HERALD | November 21, 2001 | Park Ung-suh
Since the creation of GATT in 1948, there were altogether eight rounds of intergovernmental negotiations all dedicated to the noble cause of improving international trade environment and promoting world economic growth. According to the statistics reported by WTO, the world total GDP grew by roughly sixfold and total trade exploded by more than 15 times since the inception of GATT. Direct causal link between these two phenomena can be a subject for a debate among academic economists but the high correlation between them simply cannot be ignored. On the other hand, opponents against the so-called neo-liberalism effectively attract the attention of the world by highlighting the excessive speed with which the leading nations of the world are trying to drive the international trading system into a truly unfettered and effectively open market. Some developing and least-developed countries of the world simply can not survive this onslaught of market opening and international competition. Compassion to the weak and efficiency through brutal competition are the two main ideological premises for which many people dedicated their lives and our civilization has struggled to resolve an acceptable balance over centuries without success. WTO is an institution dedicated to the freer competition and efficient market and caring for the weak is not its concern. The Ministerial Declaration made at Doha, Qatar on November 14, 2001 addresses this tricky question by adding agreements by the Council to make the 'special needs of some developing and least developed countries as an integral part of the future negotiations.' And this remark appears repeatedly at the end of nearly every single agreement from agricultural round to household management rules which is called 'the organization of work program' in WTO lingo. Whether this special attention by the ministers will calm the violence on the street, one needs to wait to find out. However it is apparent that no amount of kind words by trade ministers can change the objective of the WTO from the achievement of market efficiency and economic growth to making the world a more egalitarian place. There are altogether seventeen work programs the ministers agreed on in Doha. They include agriculture, services, market access for non-agricultural products, trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights (Trips), relationship between trade and investment, interaction between trade and competition policy, transparency in government procurement, trade facilitation, WTO rules, dispute settlement understanding, trade and environment, electronic commerce, small economies, trade and transfer of technology, technical cooperation and capacity building, least-developed countries, and special and differential treatment. As the title of the declaration shows, what ministers agreed to is a work program to set up meetings by specialists and technocrats. They will meet from now until March, 2003 or in some cases May, 2003 in order to bring out specific commitments by the member countries to improve on their trade conditions and reduce any trade impediments, or simply to create modalities for further commitment by the members. One of the highlights in the agreements is contained in the agricultural section. In the original Uruguay Round, members agreed to cut tariffs by an average of 35 percent over 6 years in case of developed countries, and 10 years for developing countries starting from January 1, 1995. Agricultural subsidies and import quotas are important parts of the agricultural inducountries actually export these over-produced goods to other countries where the amount of subsidies are not as big. This is what economists call the 'distortion' in trade. In the Doha declaration, ministers agreed to bring about "substantial" improvement in market access and reductions in market-distorting subsidies. Needless to say, the special needs of food security and rural development of developing and least-developed countries are taken into account according to the ministers. One of the reasons that dragged the meetings longer than originally planned is the debate surrounding the introduction of 'non-trade concerns' as one of the basis' of agricultural negotiations. In this case non-trade concern is about the same as the poor country's concern on food security and rural development, but mark my words that there are a lot more non-trade concerns in many other sectors than in agriculture. It is far more than economic problems. It is going to be extremely difficult to contain the concept of non-trade concerns to agriculture because cultures and civilization are non-trade concerns and continuous market opening will inevitably collide with the preservation of unique cultures (pardon me for the Huntingtonian prophecy).
The other sixteen issues contain no revolutionary changes compared to the Uruguay Round. In fact most of them pick up issues and agendas where the Uruguay Round left off. However, in paragraph 36, there is an interesting remark about Trade, Debt, and Finance. Ministers agreed to examine any possible relationship between trade, debt and finance and listen to any 'possible' recommendations that 'might' be made by the working group within the mandate and competence of the WTO to safeguard our trading system against financial and monetary instability. The WTO's incompetence is a wise excuse for dodging from such a tricky question as international financial instability but ambivalence and indifference shown here embarrassingly contrasts to the burning enthusiasm shown in other issues.
Park Ung-suh is professror of business administration at Sejong Unversity, and served as a CEO to several Samsung Group companies. - Ed.
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