Doha回合的世界貿易談判又再度失敗，最主要的原因仍來自農業問題。雖然美國農業界早已一再向農民發出預警，來因應農產品關稅及補助下降。但是，最後談判破裂，證明了農民雖然是世界貿易人數少的一群人，卻因為其文化、情緒性的性質，在許多國家內都擁有超過其人數的影響力。以美日來說，農民的人口不到百分一、二的勞動人口，但，他們卻有著關鍵性的影響力，遠超過他們的人數。至於在一些開發中國家，印度、巴西、印尼等，更不用說，農民仍是主要的投票人口，讓這些國家必須在貿易自由化的談判中堅持不在農業上讓步，縱使這些國家的製造業及外包的人力中心，都從貿易自由化得到相當多的好處。
在民主國家中，選民特色是，受到利益傷害大的選民永遠會發揮比受益者大的力量。再加上，農業在很多國家中，美國、歐洲皆然，不是經濟問題，雖然農業在經濟中的角色愈來愈小，但仍有很多人視農業為社會的根本，它是很情緒化而且是文化的問題，「畢竟我們都是從農業社會走過來。」
這次世貿談判破局的另一原因是，工業界及電腦製造業等這些產業，此次都被積極涉入談判，一方面也是因為他們可能都認為既使沒有達成更多協議，他們對未來的景氣也都相當看好，另一方面可能來自世界貿易的狀態已經多少改變了，這些業者早已全球化，他們對企業部局全球，所以，在單一國家內爭取關稅下降、降低貿易障礙，對他們而言沒有那麼重要，而且因為全球部局的結果，世界貿易的協議對他們的利弊計算起來愈來愈複雜。
In global trade talks, farmers wield outsize clout
By Steven R. Weisman and Alexei Barrionuevo The New York Times
Published: July 26, 2006
Across the American Midwest, Mike Johanns, the son of an Iowa dairy farmer who serves as the U.S. agriculture secretary, has been tirelessly warning farmers that a successful global trade deal might slash the subsidies and tariffs they’ve grown accustomed to for decades.
Now the collapse of talks aimed at getting a trade deal is the latest illustration of the outsize clout of farmers in the United States, Europe, Japan, India and other trading partners, all of whom failed to compromise on lowering the trade barriers that protect agriculture across the globe.
In Europe, the United States and Japan, farmers account for a tiny percentage of the work force and the economy. But they have become the pivot of global trade talks, able to make or break a trade deal.
”Agriculture has always had enormous influence in trade talks because of a central truth,” said Stuart Eizenstat, a former under secretary of state for economic affairs in the Clinton administration. ”Constituents who feel disadvantaged by trade deals can always outmaneuver those constituents, or the general public, that benefits from them.”
The current round of talks was initiated in the city of Doha in Qatar after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, in part to reach out to the world’s poorest countries by offering them the ability to export farm products to wealthy countries. They became known as the ”Doha development round” because of the importance of that goal.
Though farmers make up a small percentage of the work force in the developed countries participating in the talks, their leverage is enormous, because of cultural and economic reasons.
This year, with President George W. Bush and the Republican Party facing likely setbacks in the election in November, neither Democrats nor Republicans can afford to alienate farmers by agreeing to a trade deal that diminishes their subsidies and supports without offering gains in markets overseas in return.
There is also the farmers’ ability to play on cultural and romantic feelings that many in these countries have about people who work the land. The offer made by the chief European negotiator, Peter Mandelson, was deemed ”unacceptable” by leading French politicians even as it was derided by the United States as minimal.
”Agricultural is so emotional and so cultural for many nations, including ours,” said John Engler, president of the National Association of Manufacturers and former Republican governor of Michigan. ”We were all agrarian societies once upon a time. It leads to these enormously noncompetitive agriculture sectors that people are trying to protect.”
The failure of the recent trade talks was hailed throughout the U.S. Congress this week. Leaders on both sides of the aisle said in almost the same words that ”no deal was better than a bad deal” in the current trade talks.
In several states in the American farm belt, Republicans are worried about losing votes and giving the Democrats an opening, so the Bush administration could not afford politically to compromise on lowering tariffs and farm supports.
Indeed, the political situation is so fraught that some experts wonder why the administration scheduled a make- or-break session now. ”This has been badly handled,” said Mickey Kantor, a former trade envoy and commerce secretary under President Bill Clinton. ”To have a trade negotiation at this point and try to get the Bush administration to make very difficult choices which will affect a number of congressional districts three or four months before an election doesn’t make sense.”
Schwab, in an interview, said that the United States was prepared to compromise but would not put its ideas on the table because of European intransigence. Had the Europeans come in with ”additional flexibility” in their position, she said, the United States would have been prepared to change its position.
Mandelson, also in an interview, said that the European offer to compromise was dismissed by the United States because of American domestic politics.
”I understand the politics of this situation,” he said. ”I understand the politics and the pressures of the farm lobby. Coming from Europe, I understand agricultural politics quite well.”
Two other factors have given the farm producers more clout. First has been the role of big developing countries like India, which also resisted lowering their protective barriers for farmers and expected that the current round of talks would not force them to do so.
A second factor is that the banking and insurance industries and large manufacturers of things like computer parts and specialty steel have stood back from the political dynamics in the current round, many experts say.
In the 1990s, Clinton was able to muster support for trade deals against opposition within his party because of the power of industry and services. But these industries have benefited so much already from trade deals that they have not entered the fray as much lately. Big banks and insurance companies are already making inroads in China and other developing countries, for example.
Schwab said that if a deal were made, these industries would support it. ”Most of these companies, the manufacturers and service providers, have to focus on quarterly earnings,” Schwab said. ”Once they see that there’s a trade deal, assuming it’s a good deal, and it translates into new trade flows, they’ll be there.”
文章定位：
