Today is the new round of the WTO free trade negotiation in Cancun, Mexico where trade ministers from all over the world will be negotiating on the extent and the scheduled commitment of liberazing thier domestic service sectors under the WTO aegis of the General Agreements on Trade and Service (GATS). 164 countries that have made accession to the WTO will further negotiate their commitments amongst them before the conclusion to be reached in 2005 at the conclusion of the negotiation. I will write more on the GATS.
Should this round goes through, I am hoping for more liberalization of EU and US agricultural non-quantitive tariffs, i.e. subsidies, removal of subsidies in the American steel industry, and that the concerns of developing and poor nations over GATS threat on undermining these nations states ability in charting their development policies and poverty reduction effort, are attended to.
Otherwise, let's hope that the farmers associations who are already there in Mexicos as well as the entire anti-globalization protesters could bring down this meeting just like what they did at Seattle few years back!
And the latest news from AFP reported that a farmer of South Korean origin stabbed himself to death as a protest against the WTO. The AFP news reads:
"Kung Hae Lee, 55, who headed South Korea's Federation of Farmers and Fishermen, stabbed himself in protest against the WTO, "which destroys Korea's economy and its agriculture", a fellow-militant said."
Here is the picture (Photo: AP) of Lee minutes before his death.
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