Agricultural Policy - World Trade Organization Actions

World Trade Organization Actions

In April 2004 the WTO ruled that 3-billion dollars in US cotton subsidies violate trade agreements and that almost 50% of EU sugar exports are illegal. In 1997-2003, US cotton exports were subsidized by an average of 48%.The World Trade Organization (WTO) has extracted commitments from the Philippines government, making it lower import barriers to half their present levels over a span of six years, and allowing in drastically increased competition from the industrialised and heavily subsidised farming systems of North America and Europe. A recent Oxfam report estimated that average household incomes of maize farmers will be reduced by as much as 30% over the six years as cheap imports from the US drive down prices in the local markets. The report estimates that in the absence of trade restrictions, US subsidised maize could be marketed at less than half the price of maize grown on the Philippine island of Mindanao; and that the livelihoods of up to half a million Filipino maize farmers (out of the total 1.2 million) are under immediate threat.