Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-11-17-Speech-3-164"
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"en.19991117.6.3-164"2
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"May I begin by congratulating Mr Schwaiger on an excellent report. The Seattle round is being called the ‘development round’ for the millennium. I represent the south-east of England, one of the richest parts of the European Union, having been born in a developing country in Asia, one of the poorest parts of the world. I hope I can therefore span, understand and recognise the aspirations of the developed world, and of the developing world, recognising the enormous benefits of global free trade whilst also recognising the imperative need to manage the transition, to enable and empower the developing world to be an equal partner in globalisation.
The multilateral trading system was born in Havana in 1948 as the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs. Eight rounds of trade globalisation have helped to promote global prosperity. Since 1951, world trade has grown 17-fold, world production more than quadrupled, world per capita income doubled, average tariffs dropped from 40% to 4% in industrialised countries. Today, a further cut of 50% in border protection, including agricultural subsidies, would add over USD 370 billion to global annual welfare gains. Sixty per cent of this would accrue to developing countries. However, globalisation must be a win-win situation. There should not be winners and losers. Everyone should win. It can be made to happen. How can it be made to happen? The multilateral system should be fair, transparent, accountable and link trade to development. It should look at the impact of liberalisation on investments, competition rules, unfair subsidies, poor labour standards, environmental protection, intellectual property rights, trade facilitation, government procurement, improved access to agricultural markets, improved access to commercial markets including services, consumer protection and capacity building.
The European Union is unique in terms of the history of its relationships with countries around the world – Britain with the Commonwealth, France with its French francophone countries. We can send a clear message to Seattle that this is the single contribution that this House and its Members can make to world global trade."@en1
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