The US is scrapping cotton subsidies. While good for Texan farmers, these are a major distortion to world trade, and mean that poor farmers in third world nations (who ironically grow a better product) can't compete against dumped American cotton. Brazil, a major cotton producer, took the US to the WTO over this and won. However, the US dragged its feet on complying with the WTO decision, and it took the threat of trade sanctions to get them to finally act. But now they have, and both the Senate and House of Representatives have voted to comply with the WTO's ruling.
This is great news for poorer countries, and it shows that the US can be made to abide by international rules every so often. Now, if only we can get them to do that for torture...
4 comments:
It would be great if we could do the same for wool subsidies. We still have subsidies enacted in the 1950s, created to ensure we had enough wool for military uniforms.
Posted by Anonymous : 2/03/2006 03:12:00 AM
Yay for the WTO. That just leaves sugar, beef, grains, dairy, steel...
Posted by Will de Cleene : 2/03/2006 10:15:00 AM
Wow. I actually agree with you on this one - well done the W.T.O and America.
Now of course it'll be interesting to see whether there's any chance they'll liberalise the other half of the free trade equation: immigration.
Posted by Duncan Bayne : 2/03/2006 05:02:00 PM
Free trade = slavery. No supporter of free trade has been in support of fair employment laws or unions.
Posted by Anonymous : 2/04/2006 10:41:00 AM
Post a Comment
(Anonymous comments are enabled).