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The Doha Development Deal: missing presumed dead?
23 July 2008
According to the World Development Movement, the 'development' element of the Doha Development Round is 'missing presumed dead' and any claim that the talks hold the answer to the global food crisis is little more than ‘spin and hyperbole’. A report released today by the World Development Movement highlights the failure of the international trade talks, starting today, to deliver any benefit for the world's poorest people.
Benedict Southworth, director of the World Development Movement said:
"It's clear that Pascal Lamy, the EU and the US want a new trade deal at any cost. While this has been a trade round supposed to lift the poorest people in the world out of poverty, the outcomes of the last ministerial meeting in Hong Kong in 2005 were a bad deal for poor people and the environment.
“The meeting this week will see another push by the EU and US for the rapid opening of developing countries' markets.”
The report also refutes the claim that this round will represent a solution to the world's economic ills and the current global food crisis.
Benedict Southworth continues:
"It is foolish to claim that these talks and greater trade liberalisation will have a positive impact on the global food crisis and global economic downturn.
“After all, it was the lax regulation of global markets that created the current world financial problems, while the causes of the food crisis are far too complex to be solved by a simplistic call for ever more trade liberalisation.
“It's simply spin and hyperbole designed to push developing countries into signing up.”
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ENDS
For more information, or a copy of the report, please contact
Kate Blagojevic
Press officer, World Development Movement
0207 820 4900/4913, 07711 875 345, Email:
Benedict Southworth will be available for interview - ISDN available.
Notes to editors
The World Development Movement (WDM) has been campaigning on trade issues for almost three decades and monitoring negotiations at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) since its creation in 1995.
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