CommonDreams: Celebrate, Don’t Mourn, Collapse of WTO Talks

[marmar]

Published on Thursday, July 31, 2008 by CommonDreams.org
Celebrate, Don’t Mourn, Collapse of WTO Talks
by Robert Weissman


Predictably, the cheerleaders for corporate globalization are bemoaning the collapse of World Trade Organization negotiations.

“This is a very painful failure and a real setback for the global economy when we really needed some good news,” said Peter Mandelson, the European Union’s trade commissioner.

Even worse, says the corporate globalization rah-rah crowd, the talks’ failure will hurt the developing world. After all, these negotiations were named the Doha Development Round.

“The breakdown of these talks is bad news for the world’s businesses, workers, farmers and most importantly the poor,” laments U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue.

But don’t shed any tears for the purported beneficiaries of the WTO talks. If truth-in-advertising rules applied, this might have been called the Doha Anti-Development Round.

The alleged upside of the deal for developing countries — increased access to rich country markets — would have been of tiny benefit, even according to the World Bank. The Research and Information System for Developing Countries points out that Bank analyses showed a successful conclusion of the Doha Round would, by 2015, increase developing country income in total by $16 billion a year — less than a penny a day for every person in the developing world. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/07/31/10722/