RI vows to protect agro-products
Evi Mariani and Johannes Simbolon, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The government has vowed to continue protecting certain agricultural commodities against liberalization and will align with tens of other poor countries to block any efforts at the World Trade Organization (WTO) talks to liberalize trade on the commodities.
Minister of Agriculture Bungaran Saragih told the European Union's Ministers of Agriculture on Monday that basic food commodities should be exempted from liberalization because they play a crucial role in alleviating poverty and economic development in many developing countries.
"Then it should be agreeable that some limited number of strategic food staples be totally exempt from further tariff reduction and expansion of tariff quota as well as automatic access to special guard mechanisms," Bungaran said in Taormina, Italy.
Bungaran was invited to the EU's Agricultural Minister's informal meeting to present the perspective of "South Hemisphere" on the liberalization of agricultural commodities.
The EU's ministers held the meeting to review the results of the recent WTO ministerial talks in Cancun, Mexico, according to documents made available to The Jakarta Post on Monday.
Earlier, Pos M. Hutabarat, director general for industrial cooperation and international trade, said the government would continue to block any efforts to liberalize trade on strategic farm products at WTO talks together with the countries grouped in the so-called Group 33.
Each member of the group has their own strategic products, but Indonesia has named rice, corn, soybean and sugar as strategic products. The group wants that each country is allowed to set their own import duties on the commodities.
Group 33, which was launched during the Cancun summit and was co-founded by Indonesia, comprises 33 countries, including the Philippines, Pakistan and a number of African and South American countries.
He said that Minister of Industry and Trade Rini M.S. Soewandi would try to take spare time to visit Honduras -- a member of Group 33 -- during her official visit to Brazil next month.
"We will fight for special products again in the senior official meeting on Dec. 15 and the sixth WTO summit in 2004," he said.
The fifth WTO ministerial summit earlier this month decided to arrange a senior official meeting to resume talks on Dec. 15 in WTO headquarters in Geneva.
It also decided to have the sixth WTO ministerial meeting in August next year in Hong Kong, in a bid to meet the deadline of the completion of the Doha Rounds talks on Jan. 1, 2005.
Pos said during the Cancun meeting, Indonesia had gained some prominence thanks to its role in co-establishing Group 33.
Indonesia was invited to meet with developed countries.
"We (Indonesia) have never been invited to the 'Green Room' before because they (developed countries) thought we would peacefully comply with any decisions made in the meetings," Pos recalled.
The "Green Room" is a term referring to the exclusive meeting of developed, influential countries in the WTO. The forum has often been blasted, especially by developing countries, as not transparent.