| Dear Friends, This letter was sent to the Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh on August 30, 2009 and forwarded to the UPA Chairperson, Smt Sonia Gandhi and the Union Commerce & Industry Minister, Anand Sharma. Dr KRISHAN BIR CHAUDHARY
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F-1/A ,Pandav Nagar, Delhi-110091, INDIA, Telefax 011-22751281, Mobile 9810331366 E-MAIL; bharatiyakrishaksamaj@gmail.com Date : Aug 30, 2009 Dear Dr Manmohan Singh Honourable Prime Minister of India On behalf of 750 million farmers in this country, I would like to caution you and your government about the great blunder being committed in agreeing to host the WTO Mini-Ministerial meeting in Delhi on September 3-4, 2009 and to revive the process which is likely to benefit only the multinational corporations of the developed world and further marginalize the already marginalized small farmers and economies of the developing countries. Global economic and financial order has collapsed on account of the crisis generated in US in September, 2008. The crisis has already engulfed India and the country is experiencing joblessness and shrinkage in all sectors of the economy. Your government's Economic Survey 2008-09 has admitted this situation in bold letters. Same admission has been made by your Finance Minister, Pranab Mukherjee and your Railway Minister, Mamata Banerjee in their respective Budget speeches. The Reserve Bank of India and the Planning Commission in their surveys and reports too made similar admissions. There is very little hope of this corporate-led so-called liberalized economy and so-called globalised order being restored to its earlier glory. Some see a mirage in the "green shoots" which are emerging in some stray sectors across the globe and are foolishly harping on its early revival. These few "green shoots" are despite billions of dollars being pumped into the world economy by the national governments and central banking systems across the globe to revive the ailing system. These billions of dollars are, however, for the benefit of big corporate houses and not for the common man. Despite the emergence of "green shoots" several experts across the globe are not fully sure about the revival of the ailing system. They say they do not know whether it would be a L-turn, a V-turn or a Z-turn. Similar are the views of the Reserve Bank of India and a section in the Planning Commission. Your Minister for Commerce and Industry, Anand Sharma knows this situation very well and he while unveiling the Foreign Trade Policy 2009-14 had mentioned about the possibility of a L-turn or a V-turn. It is strange that knowing the situation well, your commerce and industry minister is foolishly banking on revival of stalled the WTO talks to fuel the ailing global economic machine The WTO has suffered several collapses at Seattle, Cancun, Hong Kong. It is now helpless and hopeless. Some years ago I suggested --- WIND UP WTO : SET UP A NEW PEOPLE-ORIENTED GLOBAL TRADING SYSTEM India and China are categorized as Emerging Economies and the present global financial crisis has pushed the developed countries at a point of near submergence (would be near submerging economies). But the developed world is not willing to be submerged. It is keeping up hopes by banking on opening up of markets in the Third World. They have made a mockery of the Doha Development Round. They want to maintain their high levels of subsidy, support and tariff barriers and unjustified non-tariff barriers to protect their farm sector and want markets for their goods and services in the developing world. The developed countries levels of such protectionism have increased since the beginning of the global financial crisis There is not much on the table for negotiations which would benefit the developing countries. The proposed provision for protecting the farm sector of developing countries by the way of designating Special Products and Special Safeguard Mechanism is too complicated and ineffective. The easier option for protecting developing countries farm sector from the influx of cheap and subsidized imports from developed countries is to allow them to use the clause of Quantitative Restrictions (QRs) on imports without any penalty. Fisheries, mining and forestry should not be discussed under NAMA, but under agriculture. In the NAMA text, the tilt against the developing countries is even more blatant. The universal binding of tariff, the line-by-line tariff cutting instead of the average reduction target (which was the rule in all the previous rounds), application of Swiss Formula and more than proportionate reduction in the tariffs of developing countries through low coefficients and few exceptions, which constituted the hallmark of the earlier texts continue to govern the approach in the latest text. What is worse, the Para 8 on Flexibilities which were insisted upon by developing countries to mitigate the harshness of the approach have been effectively diluted, if not nullified, by the earlier text. The Anti-Concentration Clause and Sectorals will have enormous adverse impact on our organized and unorganized sectors, fisheries and on the future of our manufacturing sector. On Services negotiations the developed countries are insisting upon the developing countries to open up their banking and financial sectors. If this happens then the developing countries like India would be directly importing the Total Virus of The Present Financial Crisis which originated and mutated in the developed countries – exactly like we are importing Swine Flu Virus today. The TRIPS Agreement does not solve our purpose as it does not recognize the relevant provisions of the Convention on Biological Diversity relating to community ownership of natural resources and protection of biodiversity and traditional knowledge. The proposal for introduction of mandatory requirement for disclosure of the origin of biological resources and/or associated traditional knowledge used in inventions for which property rights are applied for has not yet been incorporated in the TRIPS Agreement. Mr Prime Minister, therefore, it is high time that India as an Emerging Economy restrain from entertaining false hopes of revival of the ailing financial and economic system and the WTO (which is in Intensive Care Unit) and embark upon building up of a NEW PEOPLE-ORIENTED GLOBAL ECONOMIC ORDER AND TRADING SYSTEM. Yours Cordially Dr KRISHAN BIR CHAUDHARY President CC to 1) UPA Chairperson Smt Sonia Gandhi 2) Union Commerce & Industry Minister, Mr Anand Sharma | 