Institute for Agricultural and Trade Policy May 2008
全球的貿易和金融機構；包括世界貿易組織、世界銀行、國際貨幣基金會和OECD的領導者皆推動杜哈回合貿易協定完成協商，視其為解決當前糧食危機的方式。以下為推翻他們論點的七大原因，及貿易決策者應該採用，確保全球人民獲得其所需的食物之三個步驟。
第一，為什麼會有危機？
糧食危機源於一系列的狀況，每個都很重要；供給面包括小麥、稻米、玉米等主食存貨量過低已達警戒標準；油價高漲；重要的糧食生產地之氣候狀況不佳（尤其在澳洲、阿根廷、美國、加拿大等地）；特別是水、土壤等自然資源殆盡。需求面則包括全球越來越多人可負擔奶製品與肉類製品；富國開始將糧食作物轉做生質能以取代石油。這個背景的另一方面是，對商品市場前所未有的投資和投機炒作讓價格波動越來越大，並遠高於真正的供給和需求能給予的保證。
為什麼杜哈回合不能解決糧食危機？
1. 杜哈回合會增加窮國依賴糧食進口的狀況
開發中國家中有三分之二是糧食淨進口國，在越窮的國家，情況越是如此。過去20年來，開發中國家迅速地將農業市場自由化，讓貧困的生產者無法獲得政府支持。進口大增，在許多情況中是高度補貼的進口，阻礙了在地農業生產和投資。杜哈回合提出的貿易自由化只會讓國家更依賴食物進口，而不是鼓勵政府增加國內生產，重建在地糧食體系。
2. 杜哈回合讓糧價及農業生產價格波動增加
各國政府先前得以施行以緩和價格波動影響的措施（藉由控制進出口量、管控國內存糧、利用控制價格和支持價格的工具、透過配給系統創造消費者補貼）在目前的貿易和投資協定下皆受到禁止或阻撓。杜哈回合的提議會更加限制政府可能使用的保障糧食安全之工具。
3. 杜哈回合加劇跨國農企業的勢力
2006年以來，全球三大穀物貿易商：嘉吉、愛德密、邦吉分別利潤增加了36％、67％、49％。去管制化的貿易讓競爭法令有了巨大鴻溝，並創造機會給跨國農企業。自從WTO成立之後，多邊貿易規則已經再度強制主導糧食體系者，以開發中國家農民和在地產業為代價獲得地位。杜哈回合只會更加鞏固其勢力。
4. 杜哈回合無法管制金融投機炒作
自從2000年以來，商品市場的金融投機炒作已經大幅增加。聯合國糧農組織和聯合國貿易與發展委員會皆表示新的商品金融投資是造成價格波動增加的主因；然而，杜哈回合沒有任何提案是控制糧食市場的投機炒作。
5. 杜哈回合無法提出環境危機/氣候變遷
每況愈下的氣候造成糧食危機。根據IPCC，極端氣候會持續干擾糧食生產。WTO經過了14年，政府越來越不願意發展考量污染造成的成本，或與貿易相關的自然資源殆盡問題。WTO反對聯合國的環境公約，包括氣候變遷綱要公約，由於「最少貿易限制」是WTO的堅持，而且WTO不在意環境義務。
6. 杜哈回合不會降低油價
2008年4月30日，油價飆到了每桶119美金。這個價格比一年前多出74％，而且比過去100年平均價格多出5倍。石油是工業化農業的必需品，用來製成化肥、農業、灌溉幫浦、農機、運輸，因此油價深深影響糧價。石油供給大大受到寡佔的供應者控制，也就是OPEC。杜哈回合沒有任何提議指出此寡佔造成的市場扭曲。
7. 杜哈回合不會管制國際生質能的貿易
過去幾年來，生質能投資已經大幅擴張，由於油價飆升情形更加嚴重。此擴張已經在一些國家造成生質能和糧食之間用水和土地的衝突。杜哈回合的目標在於所有農產品貿易的擴張，無論其用途為何，也不會幫助政府將糧食生產視為優先。
三個政府應該採取的措施
1. 檢討烏拉圭回合的農業協定和杜哈回合
農業協定必須受到檢討，政府也一定要能貫徹強化國內糧食和農業系統的政策。政府需要工具來避免受到補貼的糧食進口。多邊貿易協定也應防止開發中國家受到糧食安全和生計的傷害。政府應該要有能力以貿易為工具，而不是把貿易視為投資國內市場的替代品。在地生產和在地工作是發展之必需。
2. 指出糧食和農業價格波動之狀況
政府需要重新建立國家與地區的公共存糧。存糧提供一個重要的減緩價格波動和糧食不安全的方式。指出波動也須要共同連結合作，以在國際層級管理供給。國際商品市場更好的連結能給生產者更公平的價錢，並給消費者更高品質、可靠的農產品供給。透明化的存糧能阻礙囤積和商品市場的炒作，在WTO中，非洲國家的集團已經提議穩定商品價格，這項提議值得我們密切注意。
3. 創造國際競爭規則
國際貿易規則不能再忽視少數跨國企業掌控全球商品與糧食市場的力量，已經造成扭曲的現象。現在已經是規範農企業市場勢力的時機了。第一步是這些企業的影響利弊需有更好的紀錄。國家也應該考慮開發中國家在國內與國際層級的競爭規範必須防止企業濫用其市場力量。聯合國貿易與發展委員會限制企業的準則可以是起步方式。
回應
Re: 杜哈回合無法解決糧食危機的七大原因
http://www.zmag.org/zspace/commentaries/3580
The Collapse Of The WTO Doha Negotiations And The Future Of Food And Farmers
By Shiva, Vandana
The spirit of Seattle and Cancun is alive. Once more the WTO negotiations were stalled/ With a combination of Southern country unity, the strength of people's movements, and let us not ignore the pressure put on negotiators by the spectare of upcoming elections in India and the U.S. Democracy trumped Doha in Geneva.
If the Doha Round was started in the Qatari capital in the shadow of 9/11 and the Bush slogan "if you are not with us you are against us", the mini-ministerial of the Doha Round in Geneva in July 2008 took place under the shadow of national elections in the world's biggest democracies, India and U.S where elections do matter. With 650 million people engaged in agriculture in India, the Government cannot ignore their votes. And Indian farmers have systematically voted out parties which ignore their survival demands for slogans of "Shining India" and "Economic Superpower India" and the corporate agenda.
This is why inspite of three calls from President Bush to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, on the WTO negotiations; India did not fall in line with the U.S as it had done on the nuclear deal just a few weeks earlier at the G-8 Summit. This had left to the left allies of the ruling coalition to walk out of the UPA, leading to the Government becoming a parliamentary minority. Commerce Minister Kamal Nath had gone straight to Geneva after the trust vote in Parliament for the ruling coalition, the UPA. The Government did win the trust vote on the basis of wheeling and dealing with small parties. However, the votes of Indian farmers cannot be bought a few votes of parliamentarians were. For one, there are too many farmers. For another, the agrarian crisis, which is a direct consequence of WTO rules and World Bank Structural Adjustment Programmes, is too deep. 200,000 farmers suicides is not a trivial issue.
When Kamal Nath said "we cannot put at stake the livelihood security of one billion people", this, in part, is what he was referring to. We tend to forget that half of humanity is farmers, and most developing countries they are the majority of the population.
For the U.S, farmers are not a "vote bank". But agribusiness is a powerful lobby. Let us not forget that the Agreement on Agriculture of the WTO is in fact a Cargill agreement. Cargill officials drafted it, negotiated it and had it made the "international law" for trade in agriculture. This "law was used by the U.S to initiate a dispute against India to remove Quantitative Restrictions in agriculture products, and India was forced to open up its market for dumping of subsidized products, be it soya oil or cotton. And it is the removal of Quantitative Restrictions, along with creation of seed monopolies through the Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (the Monsanto Agreement) that is at the root of the epidemic of farmers suicides in India.
Most of the debate and negotiations at Geneva were on the Special Safeguard Measures (SSM's) to protect Third World countries from a surge of imports of subsidized products. As Kamal Nath said "if developing countries want to guard themselves against a surge of subsidized products, of course they need a Special Safeguard mechanism". The talks collapsed because no agreement could be reached on the trigger for SSM's.
However, without the right to introduce and maintain Quantitative Restrictions, SSM's are like giving the right to a man drowning in a flood to cry out for help. It does not stop the flood itself. Removal of Quantitative Restrictions is equivalent of destruction of embankments and levees that protect regions and communities from flooding. SSM's are the scream of a person who is drowning. And the negotiations got stuck because the U.S and EU wanted to make sure the scream is authentic and the person is actually drowning before offering help. An international team of trade experts will determine whether the life boat of SSM's can be deployed or not. When translated into the reality of the agrarian crisis and the survival crisis of farmers, the WTO negotiations are a cruel joke.
The issue in WTO was and is the sovereign right to introduce Quantitative Restrictions. That is the change needed with the Doha pause. And QR's are needed not just to protect farmers from surges of subsidized imports but from the price surges due to food monopolies and speculation.
The current rise in food prices, which has led to the food crisis, is a direct result of WTO rules including the removal of Quantitative Restrictions. The increasing global control over food by agribusiness giant like Cargill is an intended outcome of the WTO Agreement on Agriculture. There would be no food riots in Haiti and Mexico and Egypt and India if trade liberalization had not destroyed the food self sufficiency of independent sovereign countries through the removal of Quantitative Restriction and hence had not violently integrated poor country economies to rich country economies, and had not brutally linked the access of the poor to food to corporate greed, corporate monopoly and corporate profits based on speculation. Prices of wheat would not rise in India if India had not been forced to import wheat. Prices of corn would not rise in Mexico if Mexico had not been forced to import corn. After creating import dependency through dumping, U.S agribusiness is now harvesting super profits through high prices.
While millions go hungry, the corporations have doubled profits. Cargills profits went up by 30% in 2007, Monsanto profits increased by 44% And these profits will increase as corporate monopolies deepen.
Farmers livelihoods and people's food rights will only be protected if QR's are reintroduced and corporate monopolies are reigned in through Anti-Trust actions. The current rules make farmers compete with farmers and countries compete with countries while corporate monopolies grow. What is needed are rules of competition that prevent the emergence of food monopolies and the practice of price fixing and speculation. For this, WTO needs to be transformed from being an instrument of corporate monopoly over seed and food to being a regulator of corporations to prevent such monopolies. If members can metamorphose the multilateral body to regulate agribusiness it will have relevance for the future. Otherwise it will be quietly buried as a bad ten-year experiment, while bilaterals take over.
This process, like the processes that derailed Doha need to grow democratically, from the ground up. WTO rules will not change for protecting farmers livelihoods and peoples right to food in the green rooms in Geneva. They will change through national parliaments, and through our everyday practices of eating food and growing it.