CARICOM Trade Agenda in the World Trade Organization

• Author: Andrea M. Ewart
• Pages: 348-366

CARICOM TRADE AGENDA IN

THE WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION

Andrea M. Ewart

24

How does a small-island nation state get

its voice heard and positions known on the

international arena? This is the challenge that

faces CARICOM Member States in many

arenas, and no less so than in the area of trade

and negotiations within the World Trade

Organisation (WTO). Like the majority of

other WTO members, CARICOM states

have used their participation in coalitions to

help advance their agenda. Indeed, with 149

members in the WTO, coalitions are crucial

not just to strengthen the position of small

countries like those of CARICOM. Coalitions

strengthen the position of all countries

lacking the political and economic capacity to

negotiate single-handedly; they are also used

within the WTO to facilitate negotiations by

reducing the number of principals.1

Upon joining the WTO, CARICOM

members became active in several coalitions

that were in keeping with their longstanding

diplomatic alliances in the developing world,

most noticeably the African-Caribbean-Pacif‌ic

(ACP) group. Interestingly, it was the coalition

strategy of the Group of 77 and the United

Nations Committee on Trade and Development

(UNCTAD) which through their observer

status in the WTO, led to the creation of the

Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) and

passage of the Enabling Clause, forerunners of

the non-reciprocity component of the existing

framework of special and differential treatment

for developing countries in the WTO.2

Beginning in the late 1990s, CARICOM

members also began to aff‌iliate with what

initially appears to have been an unusual

coalition of small vulnerable economies

(SVEs) consisting primarily of other small

island developing states in the south Pacif‌ic

and landlocked developing states in Central

and South America. The list of 51 Small Island

Developing States (SIDS) was developed by

the United Nations (UN) and sixteen of them

would eventually belong to the emerging SVE

coalition – thirteen CARICOM Member

States and three from the south Pacif‌ic. Fiji,

Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands

are geographically remote island micro-states

of the south Pacif‌ic which, like the Caribbean,

secured political independence in the 1960s

and 1970s while remaining dependent on their

former colonial powers for export markets

through the preferential arrangements granted

to ACP countries.3 The UN List of Landlocked

Developing Countries (LLDCs) comprises 31

countries mostly in Africa and Asia, three of

which - Bolivia, Mongolia, Paraguay - belong

to the SVE coalition.4

These countries may seem to have

different agendas and issues. On the one hand,

the LLDCs claim to be impeded by the lack of

access to water while on the other, the SIDS

are surrounded by it. However, these differing

geographical features mean that both groups

face problems accessing transit routes; one, from

being landlocked, the other, from remoteness

and/or the high cost of transportation. The

countries also share a colonial past that has

made their economies dependent on a limited

number of commodities for export earnings

349

CARICOM Trade Agenda in the World Trade Organization 349

as well as a number of other features that

help them together to make a strong case for

acquiring special assistance to become effective

participants in the global trading system.

They also share the goal of seeking changes to

the rules of the international trading system

that would properly take into account their

economic vulnerabilities. These commonalities

have combined to make the SVE coalition an

effective platform on which CARICOM works

to advance its agenda within the WTO.

This article will examine the emergence

and growth of the SVE coalition and the role

that CARICOM has played in this process to

advance its interests and agenda in the WTO.

While the group has earned a signif‌icant

amount of recognition and even sympathy,

has this translated into recognition of the need

for special rules for SVEs? The author posits

that success at this level has been limited,

ref‌lecting the need for greater specif‌icity and

procedural clarity to what are essentially

proposals for special and differential treatment

for SVEs. The author offers recommendations

to understand and address this shortcoming.

Emergence and Growth of the

Coalition of Small and Vulnerable

Economies in the WTO

The SVE sub-grouping f‌irst made its

appearance at the Geneva Ministerial in

1998 with the primary purpose of achieving

a differentiated approach within WTO

rules to the needs of small economies. After

experiencing a lukewarm response, today,

the issues pertaining to SVEs have been

incorporated into the WTO’s work programme

and are a standing item on the agenda of the

General Council, the organisation’s permanent

decision-making body. This section follows

the evolution of the coalition and its positions

as documented through the work of the

WTO Ministerial Conferences (the primary

decision-making body of leading ministers

held every two years), the General Council

(the permanent decision-making body), and

the WTO committees.

Individual CARICOM members began to

make their case at the f‌irst WTO Ministerial

Conference held in Singapore in December,

1996, where the Eastern Caribbean states of

Dominica, St Kitts and Nevis, and Saint Lucia

were the f‌irst to articulate, within the WTO, a

position around the special set of circumstances

they believe that small island developing

economies face within the WTO.5 Saint Lucia’s

statement, in particular, addressed at some

length its concern that though not off‌icially

recognised as less developed countries (LDCs)6

because of their smallness, insularity, fragility,

vulnerability, openness and dependence on

a single commodity export, this group of

countries was just as structurally disadvantaged

in the global economy and therefore required

special attention and concern if they were not

to be marginalized.7

Within less than two years, by the time

of the second WTO Ministerial Conference,

held in Geneva, May 1998, the SVE coalition

had begun to take shape, coalescing around

the statements made by the OECS countries.

Notably, at a February 17, 1997 meeting

of the WTO Committee on Trade and

Development, Bolivia urged that a High-

Level meeting being contemplated with the

UNCTAD, the International Trade Centre,

aid agencies, multilateral f‌inancial institutions,

and LDCs to foster an integrated approach to

assist these countries to enhance their trading

opportunities, “be integrated and applied

to other countries with small economies,

including land-locked countries.”8

At the Geneva Ministerial, in the country’s

off‌icial statement delivered by its Prime

Minister, the Right Honourable Edison C.

James, Dominica welcomed the organisation’s

work on LDCs, but reiterated the need for the

organisation to also recognise a second category

of countries, caught between LDCs and

emerging economies, the needs of which were