Press Release: 4.00pm Sept 16 2003.

Stephen Tindall-the woman

MADENZ

"Doha Is As Dead As A Dodo"

"The collapse of the World Trade Organization meetings in Cancun and the rejection of the Doha Round by the Group of 21 developing countries, is another nail in the coffin of the WTO and its free trade policies", said MADENZ founder, Stephen Tindall the woman, today.

"As our "million-dollar-mile" Trade Negotiations Minister Jim Sutton and his officials limp home with their tails between their legs, licking their expensive wounds while protesting that Doha is not dead, it is plainly obvious that Doha is as dead as a dodo," Ms Tindall says.

"It is also plainly obvious that the US and EU have no agenda to eliminate subsidies and to institute fair trade, nor do US trade negotiators honour the sovereignty of any country other than their own."

"How much longer do New Zealand manufacturers have to be sacrificed like lambs for the slaughter, while Mr Sutton lies down on his back waiting for a scratch on his tummy from a disinterested WTO that makes a mockery of his loyalty to their hypocritical free trade policies?"

"I remember a time when Federated Farmers championed "free trade", declaring that overseas markets would open their doors to our agricultural products and that our farmers would have cheap imported tractors as a result."

"Now that those overseas markets have steadfastly refused to open their doors to our agricultural products and now that our manufacturing industries have been decimated by the resulting flood of freely traded imports from China, I feel a similar degree of outrage as MP Shane Ardern, regarding the price to be paid for bringing a tractor into the debate." Ms Tindall says.

If successive governments had really believed that farmers needed cheap tractors in order to compete on the world market, the sensible solution would have been to place a tariff concession on that one product - not to eliminate tariffs on everything else.

Better still, the New Zealand government could have backed the local manufacture of tractors, just like the Malaysian government has backed the local manufacture of a car that now supplies 75% of their domestic market and employs thousands of Malaysian workers.

"Doha is Dead! Long Live Alternatives To Economic Globalization!"