As we know, the stumbling block in the Doha Round has been the Special Safeguard Mechanism in Agriculture. The first impression is that the stalemate is a result of a conflict between those who would like to sacrifice poor peasants in developing countries and those who want to protect these poor peasants.
In fact, this impression is misleading because everybody agrees that poor peasants in developing countries must be protected. The real issue however is about who must pay for this protection. My proposal is thus simple. Let’s protect the world poor peasants in developing countries but through a different mechanism than the one advocated by India and China.
To this end, developing countries governments would be allowed in case of a threatening surge of agricultural imports to grant direct payments to their peasants plus a reasonable adjustment of tariffs at the border as they claim now.
These direct payments would be completely shielded not only from any reduction commitments and inclusion in the total amount of agricultural support but most importantly from any multilateral action or countervailing duties under the SCM Agreement or any other agreement.
As a result, poor peasants in developing countries would be protected for their livelihood but the payers would be different from what developing countries want now. A certain reasonable adjustment through tariffs would be allowed but at least half of the protection of poor farmers would come from developing countries' government budgets and the urban elite of developing countries as taxpayers. This urban elite would in any case be partially compensated by the lower prices of food resulting from a moderate adjustment of tariffs at the border in this new version of the Special Safeguard Mechanism.
It is also possible to use this opportunity for a collaboration between the World Bank and the WTO for countries who do not have the money for these complementary transfer payments.
