May 13, 2008 (LPAC) -- “World food crisis : for an international ‘New Deal’” is the interesting title of a new paper published in Le Figaro May 12 by French Agricultural Minister Michel Barnier in the context of the debate leading to the June FAO summit. Barnier reiterates what he already said in a letter to the Financial Times two weeks ago, debunking the main arguments of British Imperial free traders. Adding the label “New Deal” will not make London very happy about the French position.
Asked if the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the real source of food riots and hunger (as the British have it), Barnier first defends all the recent EU measures to lower its subsidies and exports in order “not to distort” fair trade market conditions, while otherwise signaling that the EU is already the most open market for exports from the poorest nations.
More seriously Barnier underlines that “without the CAP on our continent, our food security and diversity would diminish”. The journalist then asks if the liberalization of trade will offer a solution to the food riots ? Barnier: “Those who think that the future of the poorest nations depends in essence on their capacity to export to rich countries are unaware of reality. The choice of cash crops has destroyed subsistence crops and didn’t generate sustainable development. The answer to food insecurity is neither brutal liberalization of trade, which implies putting into competition farmers who’s capability to compete varies between 1 and 1000, nor protectionism. The answer is the development of agriculture all over the world and not only there where it is profitable to produce it. The latest report of the World Bank is without ambiguity: the investment in agriculture is the most efficient lever to fight poverty and eliminate famine.”
Hinting at the British Empire WTO hoax, Barnier writes that “In that context, the losers of an agreement at the WTO, as it also said by the World Bank and the Carnegie Foundation, will be the poorest nations. The great winners will be the emerging countries already possessing a modern and competitive agriculture, mainly Brazil, Argentina or Thailand, but also developed nations that are huge agro-exporters such as [Commonwealth members] Australia and New Zealand…”
Barnier concludes: “It is now recognized that food is not a simple matter of trade. To feed a planet with 9 billion inhabitants in 2050, all the potentialities must be exploited. What the poor countries need are common development projects to develop production, price stabilization, import regulation and the amelioration of the functioning of their local and regional markets as well as the protection of their farmers.”
“My conviction is not new. Food cannot be left to the laws of the market alone, neither to financial speculation nor to lower sanitation or environmental standards. Our agricultural policy in Europe is not a vestige of the past, it is not a historical policy. It is strategic for Europe because it brings food security, and therefore can represent a road for the development of agricultures of the world. The EU has a responsibility and France that will assume its presidency as of July 1st has the ambition to take up the question of the lack of food security. It’s ambition will be to bring together the initiatives and to build on the long term a real partnership for food and agriculture, as the president of the Republic has indicated.”
