June 2002
WTO deputy defends trade liberalization as good for food security
Trade liberalization is not inconsistent with achieving food security, according to Miguel Rodríguez Mendoza, Deputy Director-General, World Trade Organization. In his remarks before the UN food summit on June 11 in Rome, Mendoza emphasized that food security does not mean countries have to be self-sufficient in food production. Click here for full Speech.

May 17 -19 2002 - Airlie House: Trade Policy Roundtable

 

6 July 2001
Earning a seat at the table: By Lyall Howard - Deputy Director National Farmers' Federation
WTO Symposium on current issues facing the world trading system: World Trade Organization, Geneva

29 May 2001
Sugar in the WTO: an Australian perspective by Mr Warren Males - General Manager Trade and International Affairs, Queensland Sugar
ISO Workshop, New Delhi

April 7, 2000
Agriculture in the next set of multilateral trade negotiations - a perspective from the Cairns Group
by Hector Torres - Argentinean Mission to the WTO
COCERAL Congress, Amsterdam

In a punchy speech to the COCERAL Congress, Hector Torres underlined the commitment of the Cairns Group to radical reform of global agricultural subsidies. Torres made a scathing attack on the EU's concept of "multifunctionality", which he said was being used to justify agricultural subsidies irrespective of the creation of surpluses that require additional export subsidies to be disposed of. Not only are developing country's producers left to cope with the consequences but this irrational behaviour leads to some governments "correcting" the environmental consequences with additional "green" subsidies. "This is as folly as turning on the air conditioning while keeping on the heater", he said.

March 9 - 10, 2000
The failure to launch the millennium round in Seattle was very disappointing for agricultural trade but the global pressure for reform has not gone away. In his address to the 19th European Agricultural Outlook Conference - OUTLOOK 2000, Malcolm Bailey, Ambassador to the New Zealand Special Agricultural Trade Envoy, argues that in spite of the meaningful reasons why progress must be made at the WTO, the level of misplaced negative public opinion will weaken the political resolve to quickly launch the round.

September 25, 1999
Testimony on behalf of the Coalition for Sugar Reform to the Commission on 21st Century Production Agriculture.

3 April 1998
The Beginning of the End? The Push for Trade Liberalisation in Agriculture
Address by Mr Donald McGauchie,
President of the National Farmers' Federation to the Cairns Group QBE Dinner, Sydney

3 April 1998
Speech by The Hon Tim Fischer,
Deputy Prime Minister, Leader of the National Party and Minister for Trade to the Cairns Group QBE Dinner, Sydney

2 April 1998
Address by The Hon John Anderson,
Minister for Primary Industries and Energy, at the Opening Session of the Cairns Group Ministerial Meeting, Sydney

2 April 1998
Opening Address by The Hon Tim Fischer,
Deputy Prime Minister, Leader of the National Party and Minister for Trade, to the 18th Cairns Group Ministerial Meeting

31 March 1998
Remarks by Mr Dean Kleckner,
President of the American Farm Bureau Federation, in response to the Cairns Group Farm Leaders communique