UNCTAD-IX IS THE FIRST MAJOR INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE. ALL OF SOUTH AFRICA'S

10:05 PM Apr 26, 1996

UNCTAD-IX IS THE FIRST MAJOR INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE. ALL OF SOUTH AFRICA'S
ensure that UNCTAD, as an institution, not only continues to survive but does so with its "soul" and "limbs" unimpaired -- able to fulfill its mandate and further the development of the developing countries.

From every indication, UNCTAD-IX is likely to be a very difficult one. The United States and the EU are applying considerable pressure, including through the budget-cut route, to cut UNCTAD down and reduce many of its activities that focus on the policies of developed countries. Instead, they would like UNCTAD to focus on domestic policies of developing countries and the dismantling of the state from the economy.

Even before the Conference here, an UNCTAD programme to throw the spotlight on `structural adjustment' and lack of it in the industrial countries has virtually disappeared. This was a small attempt to have a counter-weight to the Fund-Bank and now the WTO pressures on developing countries to adjust, and focus, through reports and intergovernmental public debate on the lack of it in the developed countries.

But this has fallen off the table.

The pre-conference text has no reference to the structural adjustment policies in developed countries (rather the lack of it) and their implications for trade and development of the developing countries. There is no reference to this subject in the part relating to the intergovernmental machinery work programme of the Trade and Development Board and its subordinate commission.

The entire trade text itself in the document is under heavy square brackets and it sis difficult to say what will survive. But even developing countries do not seem to be aware of the potential benefits to them of bringing these issues to a discussion and scrutiny at UNCTAD.

The Trade Policy Review Mechanism in the WTO (which actually was put in place since 1989 itself, as part of the Uruguay Round mid-term review) has not been able to fulfil this role. And some early, tentative and hesitant steps by the GATT secretariat to throw the spotlight on the majors in the world economy have been quickly defanged and, by and large, the TPRM exercise (behind closed doors, with the WTO press office and the TPRM chair relaying a sanitised version of the comments from delegations) has almost become pointless and costly.

Instead, if some in the secretariat and the advanced nations have their way, the policies of the developing countries in other areas of `efficiency' (where no WTO obligations are involved) will be brought under review and scrutiny at UNCTAD.

Developing countries have not so far exhibited a unified approach, and many of the key delegations, are starting from the proposition that their main objective here is to "save" the institution and maintain a minimum of institutional and programmatic functions to build on them through the permanent machinery.

It will not be an easy task for the developing world. And while the Group of 77, at its one-day Ministerial session on Sunday, is due to adopt a Declaration at the end. Though that would affirm, among others, the unity and solidarity of the group, it remains to be seen whether at Midrand they will act with a unity of purpose that was lacking at the Geneva pre-conference preparations.

According to some Third World delegations, over the last week or so, the United States, has mooted in some of the capitals, both developing and developed, its views about UNCTAD and its future. In essence, that calls for further cuts in UNCTAD activities and to "lower" the ambitions and expectations out of UNCTAD-IX.

It would be `tempting' for some, in the secretariat and among the G77 members to find `accommodation' to keep the US on board. But with all the cost-cutting efficiency measures and change of programmatic direction, with the US participating in the final consensus, as UNIDO discovered after its last conference, there is still no guarantee that in the future the US will play constructive and active role. Similarly, there are no guarantees of support from the Europeans to strengthen UNCTAD.

The theme of the conference is built around 'globalization', and the title of the final document that will come out is on "Promoting Growth and Sustainable Development in a Globalizing and Liberalizing World Economy".

Much will be heard about `globalization' and its `opportunities' -- though often it is difficult to separate the hype from reality -- at the opening session and the televised events surrounding it: in the two round-tables of Heads of State and of heads of UN system agencies -- and in the Raul Prebisch lecture Monday by Prof Jagdish Bhagwati, one of the neo-liberal trade policy gurus and advocate of free-market-free-trade theories (that aren't practiced in the industrial centers).

The televised round tables on the opening inaugural day, a Saturday will be moderated by the ubiquitous CNN!.

In the run-up to the Conference and so far, the secretariat has taken a low-profile and cautious, and some would say ambivalent positions, on some of the critical issues of globalization.

The theme of the Conference, and the way the pre-conference intergovernmental process has gone so far would make it appear that the "globalization" and "integration" of the people into the "global" economy is not only the given to which everyone has to adjust, but that this "globalization" based on the neo-liberal theology is a desirable goal, with some attention paid to those who may be marginalized and left behind.

There will be a great deal heard. Especially, at the two `round- tables', immediately following the inaugural meeting on Saturday, where six Heads of State are meeting in one session of 90 minutes, and another of the heads of agencies to last 120 minutes, will discuss what UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali has called "The excluded Two Billion: Integrating People in the Global Economy."

The six Heads of State participating in the round-table are: King Hussein of Jordan, President Nelson Mandela of South Africa, President Jose-Maria Figueres of Costa Rica, President Benjamim Mkapa of Tanzania and Mr. Jean-Pascal Delamuraz, President of the Swiss Confederation -- all to give their views and proposals on how the lives of the two billion excluded from the "global economy" are to be bettered and what the UN and UNCTAD could do to help integrate people in the global economy?

This will be followed by another Round Table of Heads of agencies -- to be chaired by Boutros-Ghali, the IMF head, Mr. Michel Camdessus, the UNCTAD Secretary-General, Rubens Ricupero, WTO Director-General Renato Ruggiero, UNDP Administrator James Speth and the World Bank's No. 2, its Managing Director Mr. Sven Sandstrom -- who are to address the operational issues arising from the views and proposals of Heads of State.

There may be some interesting views, and even non-answers, but the format precludes any serious discussion.

On Sunday, the Ministers of the Group of 77 and China are due to hold a one-day meeting, with two ministerial round tables, one devoted to the`Challenges of Development in the Context of Agenda of UNCTAD-IX' and the second to `The Future of the Group of 77".

The Conference itself is due to get down to business only from Tuesday (30 April), with four working days devoted to general debate, and another five days the following week for drafting groups to tackle the preconference text leading to the closing plenary on 11 May.

It is difficult to be optimistic about what it will all mean for the peoples of the developing world in the closing years of this millennium and into the next.

But South Africa is the land that produced miracles. It changed Gandhi, the Barrister-at-law into a `rebel' who ultimately led his countrymen in India to freedom. And in these present times, it ended Apartheid, and brought the lonely-prisoner on Robbins Island to Head the multiracial South Africa, in many ways an industrialized and advanced nation, but one also struggling on how the non-Whites marginalised for generations could participate in and benefit from prosperity.

Nelson Mandela and his government may still produce a miracle (in these days between Easter and Ascension in the Christian calendar).