April 12, 2000
Fidel Castro: "Another Nuremberg is required to judge the unjust economic
order"
Complete text of President Castro's speech at the opening session of the
South Summit, April 12, 2000 is at:
http://www.granma.cu/ingles/abr2/16fidel-i.html
In the OECD, the club of the wealthiest, the average tariff applied to
manufactured exports from underdeveloped countries is four times higher
than that applied to the club member countries. A real wall of non-tariff
barriers is thus raised that leaves out the South countries.
Meanwhile, in international trade a hypocritical ultra-liberal discourse
has gained ground that matches the selective protectionism imposed by the
North countries.
The basic commodities are still the weakest link in world trade. In the
case of 67 South countries such commodities account for no less than 50% of
their export revenues.
The neoliberal wave has wiped out the defense schemes contained in the
terms of reference for basic commodities. The supreme dictum of the
marketplace could not tolerate any distortion, therefore, the Basic
Commodities Agreements and other defense formulas designed to face unequal
exchange were abandoned. It is for this reason that today the purchasing
power of such commodities as sugar, cocoa, coffee and others is 20% of what
it used to be in 1960; consequently, they do not even cover the production
costs.
A special and differentiated treatment to poor countries has been
considered not as an elementary act of justice and a necessity that cannot
be ignored but as a temporary act of charity. Actually, such differential
treatment would not only recognize the enormous differences in development
that prevent the use of the same yardstick for the rich and the poor but
also a historically colonial past that demands compensation.
The failed Seattle meeting showed the tedium caused by and the opposition
to neoliberal policies in growing sectors of the public opinion, in both
South and North countries.
The United States of America presented the Round of Trade Negotiations that
should begin in Seattle as a higher step in trade liberalization
regardless, or perhaps forgetful, of its own aggressive and discriminatory
Foreign Trade Act still in force. That Act includes provisions like the
"Super-301", a real display of discrimination and threats to apply
sanctions to other countries for reasons that go from the assumed
opposition of barriers to American products to the arbitrary, deliberate
and often cynical qualification that that government decides to give others
on the subject of human rights.
In Seattle there was a revolt against neoliberalism. Its most recent
precedent had been the refusal to accept the imposition of a Multilateral
Agreement on Investments. This shows that the aggressive market
fundamentalism, which has caused great damages to our countries, has found
a strong and deserved world rejection.
In addition to the above mentioned economic calamities, on occasions the
high oil prices significantly contribute to the worsening of conditions in
the South countries which are net importers of that vital resource. The
Third World produces about 80% of the oil traded worldwide, and 80% of that
amount is exported to the developed countries.
The wealthy nations can afford to pay any price for the energy they waste
to sustain luxurious consumption levels and destroy the environment. The
United States' consumption is 8.1 tons oil equivalent per capita while the
Third World consumes an average of 0.8 tons, and the poorest among them
only 0.3.
When the prices mount abruptly from 12 to 30 US dollars a barrel, or more,
it has a devastating effect on the Third World nations. This is in addition
to the external debt, the low prices of their basic commodities, the
financial crises and the unequal terms of reference's negative impact
weighing heavily on them. Now, we perceive a similarly devastating
situation emerging anew among sister South nations.
Petroleum is a universally needed vital commodity, which actually escapes
the market laws. One way or another, the big transnationals or the Third
World oil exporting countries that associated themselves to defend their
interests were always able to determine its price.
The low prices mostly benefit the rich countries that waste large amounts
of fuel, restrain the search for and the exploitation of new deposits as
well as the development of technologies that reduce consumption and protect
the environment; and they affect the Third World exporters. On the other
hand, high prices benefit the exporters and can be easily handled by the
rich but they are harmful and destructive to the economies of a large part
of our world.
This is a good example to show that a differential treatment to countries
in different stages of development should be an indispensable principle of
justice in world trade. It is absolutely unfair that a poor Third World
country like Mozambique with 84 US dollars per capita GDP needs to pay for
such a vital commodity the same price as Switzerland with 43,400 US dollars
per capita. This is a 516 times higher per capita GDP than that of Mozambique!
The San José Pact, concerted 20 years ago by Venezuela and Mexico with a
group of small oil importing countries in the region, set a good precedent
of what can and should be done bearing in mind the particular conditions of
every Third World nation in similar circumstances, although avoiding this
time any conditions associated to the differential treatment they might
receive.
Some countries are not in a position to pay more than 10 US dollars a
barrel, others no more than 15, and none more than 20.
However, the rich countries' world, prone as it is to big spending and
consumerism, can pay over 30 US dollars a barrel taking hardly any damage.
As they consume 80% of the Third World countries' exports, this can easily
compensate a price lower than 20 US dollars for the rest of the nations.
This could be a concrete and effective way to turn South-South cooperation
into a powerful instrument of Third World development. To do otherwise
would invite self-destruction.
In a global world where knowledge is the key to development, the
technological gap between the North and the South tends to widen with the
increasing privatization of scientific research and its results.
The developed countries with 15% of the world's population presently
concentrate 88% of Internet users. Just in the United States there are more
computers than in the rest of the world put together. These countries
control 97% of the patents the world over and receive over 90% of the
international licenses' rights while for many South countries the exercise
of the right to intellectual property is non-existent.
In private research, the lucrative element takes precedence over necessity;
the intellectual property rights leave knowledge out of reach for
underdeveloped countries and the legislation on patents does not recognize
know-how transfer or the traditional property systems, which are so
important in the South.
Private research focuses on the needs of the wealthy consumers.
Vaccines have become the most efficient technology to keep health care
expenses low since they can prevent diseases with one dosage. However, as
they yield low profits they are put aside in favor of medications that
require repeated dosages and yield higher benefits.
The new medications, the best seeds and, in general, the best technologies
have become commodities whose prices only the rich countries can afford.
The murky social results of this neoliberal race to catastrophe are in
sight. In over one hundred countries the per capita income is lower than
fifteen years ago. At the moment, 1.6 billion people are faring worse than
at the beginning of the 1980s.
Over 820 million people are undernourished and 790 of them live in the
Third World. It is estimated that 507 million people living in the South
today will not live to see their 40th birthday.
In the Third World countries represented here, two out of every five
children suffer from growth retardation and one out of every three is
underweight; 30,000 who could be saved are dying every day; 2 million girls
are forced into prostitution; 130 million children do not have access to
elementary education and 250 million minors under 15 are bound to work for
a living.
The world economic order works for 20% of the population but it leaves out,
demeans and degrades the remaining 80%.
We cannot simply accept to enter the next century as the backward, poor and
exploited rearguard; the victim of racism and xenophobia prevented from
accessing to knowledge and suffering the alienation of our cultures due to
the foreign consumer-oriented message globalized by the media.
As for the Group of 77, this is not the time for begging from the developed
countries or for submission, defeatism or internecine divisions. This is
the time to rescue back our fighting spirit, our unity and cohesion in
defending our demands.
Fifty years ago we were promised that one day there would no longer be a
gap between developed and underdeveloped countries. We were promised bread
and justice; but today we have less and less bread and more injustice.
The world can be globalized under the rule of neoliberalism but it is
impossible to rule over billions of people who are hungry for bread and
justice.
The pictures of mothers and children under the scourge of draughts and
other catastrophes in whole regions of Africa remind us of the
concentration camps in nazi Germany; they bring back to us memories of
stacks of corpses or of moribund men, women and children.
Another Nuremberg is required to put to trial the economic order imposed on
us, the same that is killing of hunger and preventable or curable diseases
more men, women and children every three years than all those killed by
World War II in six years.
We should discuss here what is to be done about that.
In Cuba we usually say: "Homeland or Death!" At this Summit of the Third
World countries we would have to say: "We either unite and establish close
cooperation, or we die!"
Thank you, very much.
Louis Proyect
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