Cotton Four members want Doha Round issues addressed at MC10

Members of the Cotton Four or C4, who include Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso and Benin, have said they will not discuss any fresh issues until the ones raised at the Doha Round Table on cotton are addressed.

Speaking to the press on the sidelines of the 10^th WTO Ministerial Conference, the Ministers from the four Least Developed Countries (LDCs) noted that millions of people depend on cotton farming for a living.

“We have been in discussions with the WTO for over 10 years, yet little progress has been made in terms of cotton trade,” said Chad’s Minister for Trade Aziz Ahamat Tibeg. “This is the right place to put our message out there. We hope all efforts shall be made to move us forward.”

Benin’s Minister of Trade Affo Idrissou Safiou noted that many African countries are dependent on Agriculture.

“About 40 African countries depend on cotton,” said Safiou. “We became members of WTO because we wanted access to some markets. I am sure we will arrive at some understanding. Otherwise, if all 40 countries said they are no longer going to be members of the WTO, then what next? But we are not there yet.”

The Ministers noted that the cotton industry is a promising sector.

“As African countries, we know the importance of industrialization,” stated Chad’s Trade Minister Aziz Ahamat Tibeg. “We have the Asia as an example of a continent that capitalized on industrialization. We hope that in the net 20-30 years, all textiles will be produced in Africa. The discussions we have today will have a speak to the future.”

“What we want are sustainable solutions to the cotton in the market,” Mali’s Ambassador Traore Ami Diallo said.  “It is important to comply with existing rules, that is why we continue to speak against massive subsidies. The issues at stake remain the same; we want to save our cotton sector and create jobs. We want a fairly more competitive market.”

At the December 2013 Bali Ministerial conference, members undertook “to enhance transparency and monitoring in relation to the trade-related aspects of cotton.”

They agreed to hold dedicated discussions twice each year within the agriculture negotiations (“the Committee on Agriculture in Special Session”) to “examine relevant trade-related developments across the three pillars of Market Access, Domestic Support and Export Competition in relation to cotton”.

Cotton as a specific subject has two tracks in the WTO: trade and development.

These are handled in three types of activities, developed over the years as WTO member governments’ response to a series of proposals to tackle the sector from four African countries — Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali, known as the Cotton Four or C4.