Press Releases

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                    CONTACT:   Phillip Hayes
Tuesday, August 4, 2009                                                                 435-604-3113

PARK CITY, Utah—Even though implementation of the 2008 Farm Bill, shrinking profit margins in agriculture, and belt-tightening in Washington dominated discussion at the 26th International Sweetener Symposium, farmers are still keeping a watchful eye on international matters, according to today’s presentations by a panel of trade experts.

“Doha is done.  It’s time for reality to sink in that, after eight years, there will be no deal,” said the National Farmers Union’s Katy Ziegler Thomas, one of the panelists.  “And while our industry is swamped with policy issues on climate change, renewable energy, and the farm budget coming under attack, we cannot take our eye off the ball when it comes to trade.”

World leaders, including President Barack Obama, recently set a deadline of 2010 to conclude the ongoing Doha Round of World Trade Organization negotiations.  Don Phillips, a trade advisor to the American Sugar Alliance, says this announcement has received very little fanfare among U.S. farmers, manufacturers, and service providers still reeling from previous failed attempts to conclude Doha.

“As it stands now, the U.S. is on the losing side of this negotiation—especially America’s farmers who will lose farm safety net policies and gain no meaningful access to overseas markets,” Phillips explained.

This same observation was spotlighted in an article this week on FarmPolicyFacts.org written by former House Agriculture Committee Chairman, Larry Combest.

“The trade agenda put forward by the President early this year made clear that to conclude Doha, the imbalance in the negotiations, tilted against the U.S., must be corrected,” he wrote.  “As our negotiators embark once again on an effort to conclude this long-running and disheartening negotiation, we in the farm community, and our Congressional representatives, need to remain vigilant and hold them to this promise.”

U.S. producers aren’t the only ones concerned with the imbalance of current trade talks.  Paul Ryberg, a panelist who represents the African Coalition for Trade and recently authored a paper about the importance of the U.S. sugar market to poor nations, explained that trade policies being discussed at the WTO and in Congress could weaken U.S. sugar policy and actually hurt developing countries.

“America is the world’s second biggest sugar importer and dozens of poor countries around the globe depend on the U.S. market.  If trade policies upset the delicate balance currently in place, it will harm existing quota-holders to the benefit of multinational food manufacturers and subsidized sugar superpowers like Brazil,” he said.

In addition to WTO talks, Ryberg explained proposals before Congress to extend Duty-Free, Quota-Free access to a handful of developing countries likewise pose a threat. “The outcome would be a classic case of ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul,’” he concluded. “Increasing poverty in one group of poor countries in the hopes of reducing poverty in another group of poor countries is not a worthy policy goal.”

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