south-north development monitor - SUNS [Email Edition]

SUNS #4401
Wednesday, 24 March 1999

contents

Trade: US-Cambodia textile pact abounds in inequity (Chakravarthi Raghavan)

Labour: Somavia takes over as ILO Director-General (Someshwar Singh, Geneva)

WIPO: Two new Assistant Directors-General appointed (TWN, Geneva)

Finance: Campaign for debt forgiveness gains momentum (IPS, Johannesburg)

Finance: Testing time for Russians, United States (IPS, Washington)

Agriculture: FAO promotes basic irrigation to reduce hunger (IPS, Rome)

Africa: Urged to invest in education of girls to reduce poverty (IPS, Harare)

United Nations: Towards a World Racism Conference (IPS, New York)

United States: Tension over police rises in New York (IPS, New York)

Japan: Humanitarian aid policy under question (IPS, Tokyo)

Excerpts from some selected articles:

Trade: US-Cambodia textile pact abounds in inequity

Geneva, 23 Mar (Chakravarthi Raghavan) -- A bilateral textiles agreement between the United States and Cambodia provides not only for export quotas by Cambodia, but commitments on labour standards and lowering the Cambodian tariffs on textiles and clothing products.

Cambodia is asked to reduce and bind its tariffs in two stages on 1.1.2000 and 1.1.2001 on fibres and yarns, on fabrics, made-ups and on apparel.

And while Cambodia will do this in two years, the US as part of its Uruguay Round schedules has provided that its own tariff reductions in this sector will be phased in over a 10-year period, i.e. the Uruguay Round tariff reductions will take effect only on 1.1.2005.

And at that time, most of the US tariffs in this sector will be higher than what Cambodia's would be.

Cambodia is now not a member of the WTO. It applied for accession in 1994, but a working party is yet to be named.

But the US-Cambodia agreement pact provides that when Cambodia becomes a WTO member the provisions of the accord (on labour standards and tariffs) would become necessary in relationship to the implementation of the WTO's Agreement on Textiles and Clothing and "will remain in force and notified to the TMB".

The US-Cambodia pact is for a 3-year period (1999, 2000 and 2001) and during that period, Cambodia has agreed to limit its exports in 24 categories -- gloves and mittens of cotton and MMF (C&M), men's and boy's coats (C&M), women's/girls coats (C&M), knit shirts (C), mens and boys woven shirts (C&M), sweaters (cotton), pants (C&M), Underwear (C&M), Knit shirts/blouses (Wool), Sweaters (wool), knit shirts (mmf) and sweaters (mmf).

Labour: Somavia takes over as ILO Director-General

Geneva, Mar 22 (Someshwar Singh) - Mr. Juan Somavia was formally sworn in and took over as the ILO Director-General, at a special sitting of the Governing Body of the International Labour Organization Monday.

Speaking after being sworn-in, Somavia who as Chile's Permanent Representative at the UN in New York had chaired the preparatory Committee for the UN Social Committee and brokered the final compromise there, is the first developing country national to take the post in the organization's 75 year history, outlined a four-point plan to place the 'development dimension' at the centre of all ILO activities.

Founded after World War I to protect the rights of workers, and act as a counter to the Bolshevik revolution and its emotive appeal to workers everywhere, the focus of the ILO remained for a long-time on protection of workers in organized industry in the industrial world.

Only recently, it also began to talk of labour and creation of employment and the conditions of labour in the unorganized sector in the Third World.

But on this, and over the financial crisis that broke out in Asia, the ILO has not challenged the fundamentals of the IMF- World Bank neo-liberal orthodoxy and the adjustments forced on developing countries.

WIPO: Two new Assistant Directors-General appointed

Geneva, March 23 (TWN) The executive arm of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), its Coordination Committee, has approved the appointment of two new Assistant Directors General, bringing the total number of people in that key post to three.

Mr. Geoffrey Yu, from Singapore, who held the position of Director of the Office of Global Communications and Public Diplomacy, has been named as one of the ADG. The other ADG named is Mr. Francis Gurry, an Australian national, who was the Legal Counsel at WIPO.

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