Foro Global sobre Seguridad Alimentaria y Nutrición (Foro FSN)

Este miembro contribuyó a:

    • 20 years, 15 years, binding, voluntary guidelines to ensure the R2F - and yet, no progress! Rather, in respect of SDG2/Indicators 2.1.1 and 2.1.2, “[t]he world is not on track to achieve Zero Hunger by 2030. If recent trends continue, the number of people affected by hunger would surpass 840 million by 2030.” (Food Coalition: A Covid-19 Response, FAO (2021).

      Worse, according to the State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2022, "[t]he world is moving backwards in its efforts to end hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition in all its forms. The distance to reach many of the SDG 2 targets is growing wider each year."

      One major reason for this multilateral governance failure is that many governments support their farmers at the expense of unsubsidised farmers in poor developing countries. They do so within or outside their so-called Amber Box entitlement to distort trade, negotiated in the Uruguay Round. Regrettably, what economists call dumping is not incompatible with the rules of the WTO Subsidy Agreement (ASCM). However, it violates the "do no harm" principle under Public International Law which IS binding on all states under the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (https://legal.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/conventions/1_1_1969…).

      But nobody seems to care. And the WTO is unwilling and incapable of addressing the #1 problem for improving WTO Law in respect of the R2F.

      WTO is a part of the problem: what we need is not MORE but BETTER trade!

    • Who says child labour is bad?

      As taking children out of plantation farming and factories may have even worse consequences for them, as this may lead them to be forced into even more harmful activities such as prostitution, we must discuss alternatives before sentencing poor parents and greedy employers vying for money-pinching consumers abroad (and at home).

      In Public International Law, forced labour is prohibited (ius cogens). And the Right to Education is granted under treatry law (ICESCR). These principles, and Public morals, would then mean obligations by home and host states alike, and include precaution and liability of international financial institutions. From there we can move to corporate governance, transparency, retailers and happy consumers buying food without information on the production methods including child labour.

      Seems we must talk context - and read relevant literature and WTO case law condoning child labour - before shooting with our pens and gobbling chocolate from cocoa most probably produced by children!

    • This interesting FSN debate on Covid-related interruptions along the food value chain shows the need for more research: Are the measures taken pro-trade or trade restrictive, and why? How can national policy responses include cooperation and efforts to regulate the overseas production of MNEs.

      This Webinar at the World Trade Institute (WTI) on “The COVID-19 Pandemic and Trade in Agricultural and Food Products” will examine issues and challenges raised by recent experience:

      26 June 2020 (Friday), 16:30 European Standard Time

      Chair: Peter Van den Bossche, Director of Studies WTI

      Panelists:

      Joseph Glauber (Senior Research Fellow, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), Washington, D.C., and former Chief Economist of USDA)

      Christian Häberli (WTI Fellow, University of Bern)

      Lee-Ann Jackson (Head of Division, Agro-food Trade and Markets, OECD)

      Alan Matthews (Professor Emeritus of European Agricultural Policy, Trinity College Dublin)

      The format is part roundtable, part general discussion. Participation requires registration. To register, please email [email protected]

      (Virtual) space is limited!

    • First, allow me to share the “relatively good news” in these difficult times (don’t we all need a break from bad news?).

      The Covid-19 fallout on agrifood trade is so far quite limited! The WTO Secretariat has established a new Website “Covid-19 and world trade” (https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/covid19_e/trade_related_goods_measure_e.htm). For perhaps the first time, it consists not only of government notifications (actually, extremely scarce). Most measures listed in the field of merchandise trade were actually notified or found by other organisations and in internet searches. By 12 June 2020, and of a total of 199 Covid-related entries, only six trade restrictive measures concern foodstuffs, in the form of export bans or quotas, or export licensing (in order to ensure local food availability). As many measures are actually facilitating trade (tariff waivers, VAT elimination, exemption from weight control of food transporting vehicles). All measures are temporary, and at least one has already been lifted (adjournment of new export licensing).

      Other news is less good, under a global welfare enhancement free-trader philosophy – and in a poor and mainly importing developing country perspective. “Go local” is not only a necessity, or a simple “confined consumer” preference; it now comes under the ominous name of “shortening supply chains” and is actively promoted by governments wanting to add local value, at the expense of their consumers and of more efficient producers abroad. This rings a bell for those having to reckon with, for example, “America first” or “strategic sovereignty for facemasks” politicians. For staple food, and regardless of their WTO-compatibility or impact on foreign suppliers, such trade and investment measures may well increase what some other idealists call “food sovereignty” but which, in more sober terms, might well end the vital contribution of trade to global food security.

      Another hurdle for food aid providers has had a too long life. Despite the calls by the Directors-General of FAO, WHO and WTO, food export bans apply even to the procurement of international food aid by the WFP or the ICRC. When you remember the G8 and G20 endorsements and commitments for a (WTO) prohibition of such bans, back in the food crisis 2007-09, you wonder what kind of pandemic is needed if even Covid-19 cannot bring governments to listen to the world’s best economists that these export restrictions are bad for their own farmers.

      Governance is hard to come by in a crisis. Nevertheless, perhaps we can still learn lessons before the next global crisis hits our screens?

    • Child Labour in Agriculture – Trade Issues

      by Christian Häberli[1]

      Child Labour is still frequent

      According to ILO/IPEC, Agriculture, including livestock production, fishing and aquaculture, is by far the most important sector where child labour is found, accounting for 59 per cent of all those in child labour, and over 98 million children in absolute terms. Moreover, agriculture is one of the three most dangerous sectors in terms of work-related fatalities, non-fatal accidents, and occupational diseases.[2] However, arguably both social concerns and the economic impact may be less dramatic in agriculture than in manufacturing, mining and other hazardous employment, because it consists primarily of work on smallholder family farms. Yet, an 2011 Agricultural Household Model study in Uganda, India, Paraguay and other countries found that in the absence of efficient labour markets, land ownership and land reform programmes can actually increase child labour at the cost of schooling and/or leisure time.[3] The biggest social concerns arise in respect of workers migrating with their families, and refugees in famine-prone areas without adequate support. Also noteworthy is the fact that age and gender matter in a debate on the social impact of child labour.

      Do Agricultural Exports Increase Child Labour?

      Agricultural policies and strategies help to end child labour in agriculture must not stop at the border. Small farmer family production may seldom reach export markets. Nonetheless, children of landless and contract farmers may also produce cash crops. Plantation owners may employ forced labour, including children. Hence, market interdependence and global food security concerns call for action at all levels. This has become an issue for trade in commodities and food processed by children in many poor countries. Calls for measures against ‘socio-dumping’ have brought the discussion to the international trade agenda – so far with little results.

      The WTO lacks binding ‘minimum’ social clauses, and it protects (developing) countries against discriminatory practices in the guise of alleged labour or environmental concerns. However, a new generation of economic treaties concluded by the USA and, albeit to a lesser degree by the EU, foresees consultations, litigation procedures and even sanctions aiming at the respect of social and environmental commitments in those treaties. However, with the exception of the dismissal of a US complaint in a trade agreement including Guatemala, there has been no judicial ruling under any trade agreement in respect of labour standard violations. Sanctions even for the most flagrant international labour standard violations have only been implemented through (threats of) preference suspensions or withdrawals in Bangladesh and Cambodia. Both trade behemoths, the USA and the EU, still seem to consider ‘nudging’ as the preferred course of redress for labour standards violations, even where litigation procedures with the possibility of sanctions are available, on the condition that such violations also distort trade.

      Nonetheless, despite the absence of agricultural labour-related trade conflicts on record, the measures and procedures foreseen in economic treaties appear to show a new way for reducing child labour. The race to the bottom at times supposed to accompany globalisation and trade liberalisation can be stopped, where “red lines” are drawn clearly and not merely for the protection of producers in the importing countries. Commitments to respect the Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work of the ILO (1998), for instance in new trade agreements entered into by Vietnam, can even initiate a race to the top, and protect exporters against abusive claims of politicians, trade unions and civil society in importing countries. The deal is ‘market access guaranteed in exchange for products and services respecting labour clauses’ in those treaties. Together with a ‘neutral’ involvement of the ILO, multilaterally accepted and monitored standards would also allow for better and non-confrontational stakeholder interaction than child protection standards self-defined by trade hegemons.

      Peremptory, enforceable child protection standards could thus find a new common enforcement basis in the more recent economic treaties, without the fear of free-riding by third countries benefiting from globalised trade without a bottom line.

      Christian Häberli (PhD, Law), WTI Fellow

      World Trade Institute, University of Bern (Switzerland)

      Weblinks: http://www.wti.org / https://www.wti.org/institute/people/44/haberli-christian/

      You can access my papers on SSRN at: http://ssrn.com/author=1380616

      [1] Cf. Christian Häberli, An International Regulatory Framework for National Employment Policies. in 50(2) Journal of World Trade 167–192 (2016)

      [3] Diego Angemi, Child Labour (2011): Insights from an Agricultural Household Model

       

       

    • The Role of Trade

      A yet unaddressed facet of this debate concerns the role of international trade and trade policy in promoting or preventing obesity and overweight.

      Trade contributes to food security where it increases food availability. Trade liberalisation can stimulate hitherto protected local production, increase its efficiency and resilience along the food value chain, and thereby mitigate local food insecurity. In theory, even poor consumers can then better choose the diet which is best for them.

      Safe but unhealthy food, whether locally produced or imported, cannot be prohibited. But eating today is not only a matter of free, informed choice. Obesity and overweight are related to trade rules in goods, services, and intellectual property. In a world of trade liberalisation and growing interdependence this interaction must be continuously reviewed.

      Better and more food production is an issue here. Productivity increases along the global food chain, and global branding and partly government-sponsored market promotion also increase trade in expensive but not necessarily healthier foods. Agricultural policy space, little constrained by trade and investment agreements, allows countries to at least partly protect their farmers from foreign competitors and to enjoy bumper harvests without producer prices crashing or health problems increasing. With the help of farm subsidies and risk insurance support powerful operators from rich and from some emerging economies are now able to compete, despite higher production and transport costs, even on remote markets. They can simply offload their low-end products and food surpluses – and their obesity problems – on the world market, at virtually zero cost.

      Unfettered free trade can thus increase inequalities of income and of access to healthy diets. Without accompanying measures trade may actually increase obesity and overweight.

      Health considerations should therefore play a bigger role in trade policy formulation. Many measures proposed by international health experts on obesity and diets show a more or less strong correlation between the relevant trade rules and the presently available evidence on effectiveness. This is a matter of maximising benefits and minimising risks. For instance, tariff reductions for health-promoting products, or binding market access commitments for health services should thus be reviewed jointly between trade and health agencies, including their timing. On the other side, health authorities should look at the relevant trade rules when they assess the merits of a fat tax or of consumer information with a “traffic light label” showing the weight impact of certain foods. Governments should also aim at a better use of health-supporting goods and health services. This would improve efficiency of scarce resources. Finally, trade and investment rules can also enhance and facilitate a number of non-discriminatory health measures and private operator actions.

      The lack of coordination both at the international and the national levels appear as a serious although surmountable problem. Several examples of trade frictions show that the lack of legally binding health and dietary standards impairs national implementation measures and makes them vulnerable to legal challenges in WTO litigation, not to mention parochial interests of junk food exporters and of inefficient local producers of unhealthy foodstuffs. This means that intergovernmental health, trade and financial agencies must improve their own governance and mutual support with the help of their member governments and of private operators – and by listening to advice from concerned citizens and from the scholarship.

      From an obesity and overweight mitigation perspective most important and urgent, therefore, are better cooperation, standard-setting, and synchronisation between all concerned stakeholders, both at the national and international levels, especially in a process accompanying a rapidly progressing globalisation and trade liberalisation.

    • Ad Q 1) What are the main issues for policy-makers to consider when linking climate change on the one hand and food security and nutrition on the other?

      Even/because this is a fiendishly complex issue, focus is essential. I suggest a focus on the weakest link in the food value chain i.e. smallholders in net-food importing developing countries (NFIDC). This requires a self-critical look into the reasons for the failure (i) of smallholders to even feed themselves (ii) of national and international institutions including FAO, IBRD and WTO to lift the inherent smallholder biases in their own policies and practices. The fact that many scholars and even the research arm of the World Bank itself had already identified such biases back in the 1990ies, but never acted on them, speaks long for what is basically a governance failure in many organisations and countries. Regardless of whether we consider climate change as fundamentally different challenge or as an additional factor of uncertainty impacting on global and national food security, it seems to me that without an answer and remedial action in this issue there is little chance for successful climate change mitigation especially in those countries and population groups likely to be affected most violently. Failing now would leave those smallholders with few mitigation options other than massive national and international migration.

    • Ekaterina, thanks for your summing up. I am not much for triplicas but Max Blanck asked me to feel free to react. (Btw, your reference to the Salvatici study is welcome. My favourite of a bridging attempt remains Jennifer Clapp even where I do not agree with her.

      You are right: even scientists, let alone stakeholders, have "often contradictory" views. But when you call for a "holistic food value chain approach" is this not a diplomatic term avoiding competition of ideas and among food suppliers? Pascal Lamy and Olivier de Schutter cannot be both right! (I have argued elsewhere that they are both wrong.)

      On the trade liberalisation vs food security debate, my view is still that the former is a blunt instrument able to both free AND kill farmers. By this I mean that neither towing the free trade line OR calling for food sovereignty ensures more food security. My last word, in CNN speak, would be that when the chips are down, safeguards are better than tariffs. And, in WTO speak, Green is better than Amber - but it will be a long time before this sinks in with policy space defenders, and Doha Round negotiators, everywhere!

    • Farmer Security is not Food Security!

      Food Security and Trade? A complex subject, agreed. Sadly, this debate shows that most opinions are already made. But the good news, from an academic vantage point, is that while the spectrum of opinions still varies widely, the subject is by now well-researched. A still increasing number of publications address the political, economic and regulatory dimensions at the national and the international levels of the Right to Food and of agricultural production and trade. Unlike, for instance, food security vs (foreign) investment (including, respectively, home and host state responsibilities. Somewhat surprisingly, another under-researched topic is the food security dimension of agricultural production and of border protection policies. Both free traders and “food sovereignty” advocates are quick in their (opposite) assessment of the impact of trade liberalisation on food security. Both, however, seem to overlook the fact that these policies in every country rely on domestic farm promotion and protection tools. Never mind consumer security. Or the collateral damage which such policies might have on efficient farmers in other countries – arguably even those public goods support policies notified under the WTO Green Box with little or no distortions on trade and production. My other regret is that FAO and other intergovernmental organisations have defined food secuerity but are unable to agree on Best Farming Practices to reach that goal.

      Farmer security agreed to by taxpayers and domestic consumers is fine as long as it does not come at the expense of other countries – but it does not guarantee global food security and feed a world population of 10 billion people, including those who only earn a few dollars a day.

    • Sorry for being rude. But as we all know food security is not achievable without trade and (in many cases foreign) direct investment, and appropriate rules thereon. The fact alone that today we have a big gap in this field is enough reason for concern, and work. But the fact that the whole Draft circulated here does not even once mention trade and FDI should ring an alarm bell to the whole food security community.

      Please keep working - or grow enough cucumbers in your own backyards for ensuring food sovereignty!