Public Eye on Davos 2004
Speech by Tony Juniper (23.01.04)
The secret trade meeting in Davos – why have our trade ministers gathered with the multinational companies?
Press conference at “The Public Eye on Davos”, 23 January 2004
Speech by Tony Juniper, Vice-Chair, Friends of the Earth International
Friends of the Earth International has come to Davos again this year to monitor and expose the close and very important relationship that exists between the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the World Trade Organisation. But why are we so concerned?
We are a federation of national environmental networks from 68 countries. Our mission is to advance the aim of socially just ecological sustainability. For us this means campaigning for policies and decisions that protect the planet while improving people’s quality of life. We press for action on a wide variety of issues, ranging from climate change to the proliferation of GM crops and foods. A concern that cuts across nearly all of the activities of our federation relates to the impact of corporate globalization.
Corporate globalization has seen the rise of huge private sector organizations operating in an ever more deregulated global market. The neoliberal policies that have caused this to happen have created conditions that have made most of the key environmental issues worse. The linkages between economic globalization and impacts on the environment are many and complex: they include, for example, massive damage to habitats in the developing countries because of export-led development policies, while in the developed countries compliance with trade rules and actions to preserve competitiveness act as blocks to making the policies we need to save the local, national and world environment.
As time goes by, it is ever more obvious that not only is the process of corporate globalization not working for many people and the environment, it is not even working in its own terms. The United Nations recently reported that many developing countries are getting poorer, even though the world economy has never been more integrated, or the volume of trade so vast. A report by the WEF itself published last week concludes that efforts to advance key global priorities, including environmental protection, upholding human rights and ending poverty, are failing. A variety of other sources confirm that in many countries, in Africa in particular, key development indicators are moving in reverse, not forward as promised by the advocates of corporate globalization.
The economic world order advocated by the WEF, which is now the global reality, is demonstrably not working, and that is why many people are calling for a change of direction. That is also why in September last year many voices expressed grave misgivings about proposals to expand the scope and remit of the WTO at the world trade ministerial meeting in Cancun, Mexico.
Opposition to expanding the WTO’s power and influence came from many quarters. There were developing countries who have not seen the benefits promised from previous trade agreements and who saw more dangers than benefits in the proposals being backed by the corporations. There were farmers’ groups from around the world who saw huge dangers in ever more liberalized commodity markets. The opposition included movements committed to ending poverty and rebalancing our ever more unequal world. There were also environmental campaigners – including Friends of the Earth – who were concerned about the impact that even more neoliberal policies would have on the environment. Despite the best efforts of the rich countries and the global corporations to get a deal that suited them, these critical voices were successful: trade negotiations collapsed.
Of course, some saw the collapse of the Cancun talks as a disaster: not least the global corporations and their lobby groups, who had been pressing hard for new trade rules that would open countries’ economies to yet further plunder and asset stripping. That is why they are now so active in attempting to get things back on track, including here today in Davos. New trade rules could create huge new business opportunities and enable companies to press countries to make decisions and adopt policies to advance their commercial interests. Companies are expert at harnessing trade decisions to promote their business aims – even if these conflict with the interests or wishes of wider society – and have been doing that for a long time.
Some recent examples of how companies lobby for decisions in trade bodies are many and varied: we have documented some key instances in our recent report – Business Rules. GM lobby groups have for example been very active in pressing for action under WTO rules to force the European Union (and other parts of the world) to accept GM crops into their countries – even though there are now scientifically proven dangers to the environment and while public opinion remains overwhelmingly hostile to the introduction of such foods and crops. Companies have used trade agreements to protect patents on drugs in ways that have hindered improvements to the well being of tens of millions of people. Companies have used trade agreements to take opportunities to gain ownership and control of industries in socially and environmentally sensitive sectors – such as water and electricity, and huge pressure exists to increase such opportunities through the agreement of new trade rules for investment and services. Corporations have also used trade agreements to undermine the implementation of international environmental agreements that they see as hostile to their interests – on climate change for example.
The list of cases where corporations have influenced trade policy or called for the use of trade agreements to block action for the environment or society is very long. The last thing we need now, as the failures of corporate globalization become ever clearer, is for corporations to increase the potential they have to promote their business aims at the expense of the public interest, the environment or democracy. But that is exactly what is happening in Davos today, and that is why we are here.
Trade ministers from around 20 countries are gathered in Davos today for a secret closed door meeting to review the situation for world trade policy after the collapse of the Cancun trade talks. They will be reviewing the way forward, and of course being influenced by the pro-trade discussions on the agenda of the World Economic Forum. The trade ministers here today are from all around the world and represent key interests in the WTO – including some of the countries that refused to be bullied into making deals in Cancun. With upwards of 1,000 chief executives from many of the world’s largest and most powerful companies in town, the opportunity for there to be a strong and clear business steer on what governments now do about global trade policy is very considerable. What is the detail of their agenda and what proposals will be made by the corporations is unknown to the public.
Given the critical importance of decisions that must be taken about the future of the globalization experiment, we believe that people around the world have the right to answers to some simple but important questions. For example, what is on the agenda for these Ministers? What do they hope to achieve by coming here? Which corporations will they meet with during their stay in Davos, and what do these unaccountable companies wish the Ministers to do? All these questions, we fear, will remain unanswered.
There are alternatives to the present direction of globalization. Citizens and their organizations are actively debating them – including at the World Social Forum gathering that took place in India last week. Many of these alternative ideas are now published, for example, Friends of the Earth International has produced Towards Sustainable Economies. This agenda, conceived by citizen’s groups from around the world, sets out the broad path toward an economy that respects the limits of our finite planet and places people, not corporations, at the center of policy-making.
With the failures of corporate globalization ever more apparent, it is incredible that the World Economic Forum’s is calling to accelerate the policies that are causing the problems. The Forum is not acting in the public interest, it is acting in the corporate interest. The people of the world should be very concerned that their elected representatives are meeting with these powerful companies in secret.
Speech by Tony Juniper, Vice-Chair, Friends of the Earth International
Friends of the Earth International has come to Davos again this year to monitor and expose the close and very important relationship that exists between the World Economic Forum (WEF) and the World Trade Organisation. But why are we so concerned?
We are a federation of national environmental networks from 68 countries. Our mission is to advance the aim of socially just ecological sustainability. For us this means campaigning for policies and decisions that protect the planet while improving people’s quality of life. We press for action on a wide variety of issues, ranging from climate change to the proliferation of GM crops and foods. A concern that cuts across nearly all of the activities of our federation relates to the impact of corporate globalization.
Corporate globalization has seen the rise of huge private sector organizations operating in an ever more deregulated global market. The neoliberal policies that have caused this to happen have created conditions that have made most of the key environmental issues worse. The linkages between economic globalization and impacts on the environment are many and complex: they include, for example, massive damage to habitats in the developing countries because of export-led development policies, while in the developed countries compliance with trade rules and actions to preserve competitiveness act as blocks to making the policies we need to save the local, national and world environment.
As time goes by, it is ever more obvious that not only is the process of corporate globalization not working for many people and the environment, it is not even working in its own terms. The United Nations recently reported that many developing countries are getting poorer, even though the world economy has never been more integrated, or the volume of trade so vast. A report by the WEF itself published last week concludes that efforts to advance key global priorities, including environmental protection, upholding human rights and ending poverty, are failing. A variety of other sources confirm that in many countries, in Africa in particular, key development indicators are moving in reverse, not forward as promised by the advocates of corporate globalization.
The economic world order advocated by the WEF, which is now the global reality, is demonstrably not working, and that is why many people are calling for a change of direction. That is also why in September last year many voices expressed grave misgivings about proposals to expand the scope and remit of the WTO at the world trade ministerial meeting in Cancun, Mexico.
Opposition to expanding the WTO’s power and influence came from many quarters. There were developing countries who have not seen the benefits promised from previous trade agreements and who saw more dangers than benefits in the proposals being backed by the corporations. There were farmers’ groups from around the world who saw huge dangers in ever more liberalized commodity markets. The opposition included movements committed to ending poverty and rebalancing our ever more unequal world. There were also environmental campaigners – including Friends of the Earth – who were concerned about the impact that even more neoliberal policies would have on the environment. Despite the best efforts of the rich countries and the global corporations to get a deal that suited them, these critical voices were successful: trade negotiations collapsed.
Of course, some saw the collapse of the Cancun talks as a disaster: not least the global corporations and their lobby groups, who had been pressing hard for new trade rules that would open countries’ economies to yet further plunder and asset stripping. That is why they are now so active in attempting to get things back on track, including here today in Davos. New trade rules could create huge new business opportunities and enable companies to press countries to make decisions and adopt policies to advance their commercial interests. Companies are expert at harnessing trade decisions to promote their business aims – even if these conflict with the interests or wishes of wider society – and have been doing that for a long time.
Some recent examples of how companies lobby for decisions in trade bodies are many and varied: we have documented some key instances in our recent report – Business Rules. GM lobby groups have for example been very active in pressing for action under WTO rules to force the European Union (and other parts of the world) to accept GM crops into their countries – even though there are now scientifically proven dangers to the environment and while public opinion remains overwhelmingly hostile to the introduction of such foods and crops. Companies have used trade agreements to protect patents on drugs in ways that have hindered improvements to the well being of tens of millions of people. Companies have used trade agreements to take opportunities to gain ownership and control of industries in socially and environmentally sensitive sectors – such as water and electricity, and huge pressure exists to increase such opportunities through the agreement of new trade rules for investment and services. Corporations have also used trade agreements to undermine the implementation of international environmental agreements that they see as hostile to their interests – on climate change for example.
The list of cases where corporations have influenced trade policy or called for the use of trade agreements to block action for the environment or society is very long. The last thing we need now, as the failures of corporate globalization become ever clearer, is for corporations to increase the potential they have to promote their business aims at the expense of the public interest, the environment or democracy. But that is exactly what is happening in Davos today, and that is why we are here.
Trade ministers from around 20 countries are gathered in Davos today for a secret closed door meeting to review the situation for world trade policy after the collapse of the Cancun trade talks. They will be reviewing the way forward, and of course being influenced by the pro-trade discussions on the agenda of the World Economic Forum. The trade ministers here today are from all around the world and represent key interests in the WTO – including some of the countries that refused to be bullied into making deals in Cancun. With upwards of 1,000 chief executives from many of the world’s largest and most powerful companies in town, the opportunity for there to be a strong and clear business steer on what governments now do about global trade policy is very considerable. What is the detail of their agenda and what proposals will be made by the corporations is unknown to the public.
Given the critical importance of decisions that must be taken about the future of the globalization experiment, we believe that people around the world have the right to answers to some simple but important questions. For example, what is on the agenda for these Ministers? What do they hope to achieve by coming here? Which corporations will they meet with during their stay in Davos, and what do these unaccountable companies wish the Ministers to do? All these questions, we fear, will remain unanswered.
There are alternatives to the present direction of globalization. Citizens and their organizations are actively debating them – including at the World Social Forum gathering that took place in India last week. Many of these alternative ideas are now published, for example, Friends of the Earth International has produced Towards Sustainable Economies. This agenda, conceived by citizen’s groups from around the world, sets out the broad path toward an economy that respects the limits of our finite planet and places people, not corporations, at the center of policy-making.
With the failures of corporate globalization ever more apparent, it is incredible that the World Economic Forum’s is calling to accelerate the policies that are causing the problems. The Forum is not acting in the public interest, it is acting in the corporate interest. The people of the world should be very concerned that their elected representatives are meeting with these powerful companies in secret.
