Emerging powers flex muscles to push for more influence on G8
Thursday, 12 July 2007
Hugh Williamson
An initiative by the Group of Eight wealthy nations to build closer ties with emerging economies is running into trouble only weeks after it was launched, the Financial Times has learnt.
Complaints by the emerging powers - China, India, South Africa, Mexico and Brazil - on how they were treated at the recent G8 summit have led them to demand greater influence in future G8 decision-making.
The G8 agreed on June 8 at their summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, to open two years of talks at ministerial level with the five "outreach" countries, as they are known in the G8, on topics such as climate change, intellectual property rights and social aspects of globalisation.
A report with action recommendations will be submitted to the G8 summit in Italy in 2009. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor and G8 host, said the Heiligendamm process, as the dialogue is known, was necessary because of the increased influence of these countries in shaping globalisation.
Yet disquiet at the limited role the five countries played at the summit itself, and disagreements over the anticipated role of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in facilitating the dialogue, are causing problems.
The collapse last month of efforts to revive the Doha global trade round is also weighing on the Heiligendamm process, diplomats said. Trade talks near Berlin broke up acrimoniously with the US and the European Union at loggerheads with India and Brazil. "This has hardly helped foster dialogue," a G8 diplomat said.
Diplomats from the outreach group told the Financial Times that their heads of state were annoyed that the communiqué launching the Heiligendamm process was published before the five leaders had joined their G8 counterparts at the summit. The five supported it but were upset by the diplomatic snub, officials said.
Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, later told journalists the five countries had also complained that they were not treated as equals in the talks at Heiligendamm. The G8 had asked for help from the five on issues such as climate change, but the five countries had not been taken seriously on broader global governance issues. "I said [to the G8] 'We have come here not as petitioners but as partners in a. . . fair management of the global community of nations'," he said.
"In future. . . we should get a chance to discuss issues of our concern before the G8 meeting so that our point of view can be reflected in the thought processes of the G8," he added.
Mr Singh had raised the issue with Ms Merkel, he said, adding that next year's G8 meeting, in Japan, should allow greater input from the emerging powers.
Some of the emerging economies are also opposed to the Paris-based OECD playing a significant role in the Heiligendamm process, in part because they do not want to be closely associated with what is seen as a rich nations' club. A position paper on the G8 by the five countries, obtained by the FT, says that "global governance" should be strengthened via the United Nations and improved co-operation between developing countries. The OECD is not mentioned.
Brazil said before the G8 that it did not want the Heiligendamm process to become entangled with its separate dealings with the OECD. German officials reassured the five countries the OECD would play only a "technical role", for instance by doing research.
Comments to the FT by Angel Gurría, OECD secretary general, are likely to fuel the concerns. He linked the Heiligendamm process with the decision by the OECD in May to promote the organisation's closer contacts with China, India, Brazil and South Africa.
"These processes are really intertwined," he said. "The two mandates reinforce each other." He said the Heiligendamm process would become part of established contacts, especially with Brazil, India and China (Mexico is already an OECD member).
He said he was aware the OECD role with the G8 "raised sensitive issues" but said these would be clarified in talks due this year.
Under syndication arrangement with FE
An initiative by the Group of Eight wealthy nations to build closer ties with emerging economies is running into trouble only weeks after it was launched, the Financial Times has learnt.
Complaints by the emerging powers - China, India, South Africa, Mexico and Brazil - on how they were treated at the recent G8 summit have led them to demand greater influence in future G8 decision-making.
The G8 agreed on June 8 at their summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, to open two years of talks at ministerial level with the five "outreach" countries, as they are known in the G8, on topics such as climate change, intellectual property rights and social aspects of globalisation.
A report with action recommendations will be submitted to the G8 summit in Italy in 2009. Angela Merkel, the German chancellor and G8 host, said the Heiligendamm process, as the dialogue is known, was necessary because of the increased influence of these countries in shaping globalisation.
Yet disquiet at the limited role the five countries played at the summit itself, and disagreements over the anticipated role of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in facilitating the dialogue, are causing problems.
The collapse last month of efforts to revive the Doha global trade round is also weighing on the Heiligendamm process, diplomats said. Trade talks near Berlin broke up acrimoniously with the US and the European Union at loggerheads with India and Brazil. "This has hardly helped foster dialogue," a G8 diplomat said.
Diplomats from the outreach group told the Financial Times that their heads of state were annoyed that the communiqué launching the Heiligendamm process was published before the five leaders had joined their G8 counterparts at the summit. The five supported it but were upset by the diplomatic snub, officials said.
Manmohan Singh, the Indian prime minister, later told journalists the five countries had also complained that they were not treated as equals in the talks at Heiligendamm. The G8 had asked for help from the five on issues such as climate change, but the five countries had not been taken seriously on broader global governance issues. "I said [to the G8] 'We have come here not as petitioners but as partners in a. . . fair management of the global community of nations'," he said.
"In future. . . we should get a chance to discuss issues of our concern before the G8 meeting so that our point of view can be reflected in the thought processes of the G8," he added.
Mr Singh had raised the issue with Ms Merkel, he said, adding that next year's G8 meeting, in Japan, should allow greater input from the emerging powers.
Some of the emerging economies are also opposed to the Paris-based OECD playing a significant role in the Heiligendamm process, in part because they do not want to be closely associated with what is seen as a rich nations' club. A position paper on the G8 by the five countries, obtained by the FT, says that "global governance" should be strengthened via the United Nations and improved co-operation between developing countries. The OECD is not mentioned.
Brazil said before the G8 that it did not want the Heiligendamm process to become entangled with its separate dealings with the OECD. German officials reassured the five countries the OECD would play only a "technical role", for instance by doing research.
Comments to the FT by Angel Gurría, OECD secretary general, are likely to fuel the concerns. He linked the Heiligendamm process with the decision by the OECD in May to promote the organisation's closer contacts with China, India, Brazil and South Africa.
"These processes are really intertwined," he said. "The two mandates reinforce each other." He said the Heiligendamm process would become part of established contacts, especially with Brazil, India and China (Mexico is already an OECD member).
He said he was aware the OECD role with the G8 "raised sensitive issues" but said these would be clarified in talks due this year.
Under syndication arrangement with FE