Socrates
March 20th 2003, 07:14 AM
This is from one of Australia's leading financial journalists.
I hope you Americans will take note. Make your elected representatives realise that they should fear your wrath for paying extortionate prices for sheep meat more than the greedy and inefficient farm lobby that has so many Congressmen under its thumb.
17 March 2003 9:00:00 AM
By Michael Pascoe
You'll be hearing a lot about a free trade agreement (FTA) with the US this week, but it's not true — it's really an ITA.
ITA stands for improved trade agreement and the most likely outcome, despite official denials about anything so mercenary, is that Australia will be rewarded for being willing to send troops to Iraq. The Australian Government won't properly care for the widows and fatherless children of killed SAS members, but our farmers will sell a few more tonnes of beef, lamb, sugar and dairy products and we might see those big catamarans built in Hobart and Perth plying US waters.
That reward in turn is likely to be at the expense of those not so willing to go all the way with the USA. While both sides to the talks starting in Canberra this week might be saying "everything is on the table", that also is not true.
A "free trade agreement" to the man in the street means a free trade agreement — no barriers between the two countries. From our perspective, it would primarily mean an end to the ridiculous quotas and tariffs on our agricultural produce.
Whatever comes out of the talks, it certainly won't be that. The idea of the US farm lobby and the senators it owns allowing Australian farmers a fair go in the US is totally ridiculous. After all, this is the same country that used September 11 as an excuse to extend its agricultural subsidies. Yes, folks, to help fight terrorism, US peanut farmers get more money from US taxpayers.
We are likely to have our quotas increased — and that will be nice — but it will be at the expense of other nations. You don't have to think too long and hard to come up with the name of a rural exporter nearby who has been vocal in not supporting Bush's stated hegemony ambitions. I wouldn't bet against a New Zealand team winning the Super 12 this year and the All Blacks should start favourite for the Rugby World Cup, but I'll take whatever odds I can get on Australian lamb replacing some of the Kiwi stuff in US supermarkets. Ditto dairy products.
(I also wouldn't mind a wee punt that one of the things Canberra will trade for the ITA is the AWB's single-desk wheat export monopoly.)
Whatever the official lines might be this week, the reality is that good domestic American politics under the Bush Administration will win out every time over good economics. That's been the track record so far and there's no reason to suspect a change. Thus the American farm lobby won't really be confronted.
Of course, good economics over time generally results in good politics, but that's only for governments that have the political nerve and intellectual capacity to see that — no-one's accusing the Bush administration of either. Thus American taxpayers heavily subsidise massive American agribusiness, promote inefficient farming and do their bit to corrupt world markets, generally to the disadvantage of poorer countries.
The benefits of opening up to free trade have been most obvious here. The reforms of the 80s and early 90s paid off big time in the way Australia has sailed through the past half dozen years of international crises. The protectionists amongst us still hunger after the "good old days" of inefficient industries sponging off and bringing down the efficient, but we've managed to get beyond that. The US has not and is not about to under this short-sighted Administration.
Yes, other countries are worse — the Europeans most definitely and Japan (on agriculture) perhaps worst of all — but that doesn't excuse the US at all. What the corrupting farm lobby won't let America see is that the United States itself would be better off with agricultural free trade.
In the meantime, Australia will pay its price in Iraq for this ITA and maybe John Howard can reprise Cold Chisel's 'Ita' from the East album:
Every week, in every home
She got wholesome news for the family
I believe, I believe, in what she says
Yes I do
I believe, I believe, at the end of the day
Her magazine'll get me through.
I hope you Americans will take note. Make your elected representatives realise that they should fear your wrath for paying extortionate prices for sheep meat more than the greedy and inefficient farm lobby that has so many Congressmen under its thumb.
17 March 2003 9:00:00 AM
By Michael Pascoe
You'll be hearing a lot about a free trade agreement (FTA) with the US this week, but it's not true — it's really an ITA.
ITA stands for improved trade agreement and the most likely outcome, despite official denials about anything so mercenary, is that Australia will be rewarded for being willing to send troops to Iraq. The Australian Government won't properly care for the widows and fatherless children of killed SAS members, but our farmers will sell a few more tonnes of beef, lamb, sugar and dairy products and we might see those big catamarans built in Hobart and Perth plying US waters.
That reward in turn is likely to be at the expense of those not so willing to go all the way with the USA. While both sides to the talks starting in Canberra this week might be saying "everything is on the table", that also is not true.
A "free trade agreement" to the man in the street means a free trade agreement — no barriers between the two countries. From our perspective, it would primarily mean an end to the ridiculous quotas and tariffs on our agricultural produce.
Whatever comes out of the talks, it certainly won't be that. The idea of the US farm lobby and the senators it owns allowing Australian farmers a fair go in the US is totally ridiculous. After all, this is the same country that used September 11 as an excuse to extend its agricultural subsidies. Yes, folks, to help fight terrorism, US peanut farmers get more money from US taxpayers.
We are likely to have our quotas increased — and that will be nice — but it will be at the expense of other nations. You don't have to think too long and hard to come up with the name of a rural exporter nearby who has been vocal in not supporting Bush's stated hegemony ambitions. I wouldn't bet against a New Zealand team winning the Super 12 this year and the All Blacks should start favourite for the Rugby World Cup, but I'll take whatever odds I can get on Australian lamb replacing some of the Kiwi stuff in US supermarkets. Ditto dairy products.
(I also wouldn't mind a wee punt that one of the things Canberra will trade for the ITA is the AWB's single-desk wheat export monopoly.)
Whatever the official lines might be this week, the reality is that good domestic American politics under the Bush Administration will win out every time over good economics. That's been the track record so far and there's no reason to suspect a change. Thus the American farm lobby won't really be confronted.
Of course, good economics over time generally results in good politics, but that's only for governments that have the political nerve and intellectual capacity to see that — no-one's accusing the Bush administration of either. Thus American taxpayers heavily subsidise massive American agribusiness, promote inefficient farming and do their bit to corrupt world markets, generally to the disadvantage of poorer countries.
The benefits of opening up to free trade have been most obvious here. The reforms of the 80s and early 90s paid off big time in the way Australia has sailed through the past half dozen years of international crises. The protectionists amongst us still hunger after the "good old days" of inefficient industries sponging off and bringing down the efficient, but we've managed to get beyond that. The US has not and is not about to under this short-sighted Administration.
Yes, other countries are worse — the Europeans most definitely and Japan (on agriculture) perhaps worst of all — but that doesn't excuse the US at all. What the corrupting farm lobby won't let America see is that the United States itself would be better off with agricultural free trade.
In the meantime, Australia will pay its price in Iraq for this ITA and maybe John Howard can reprise Cold Chisel's 'Ita' from the East album:
Every week, in every home
She got wholesome news for the family
I believe, I believe, in what she says
Yes I do
I believe, I believe, at the end of the day
Her magazine'll get me through.