Mexican President Felipe Calderon said on Sunday that the government would eliminate tariffs on wheat, corn and rice as part of a plan to counter rising food prices that have provoked street protests.
Calderon blamed high food costs on global factors, including rising energy prices, soaring food demand in China and India and the use of corn for ethanol production.
But some Mexicans point to the elimination of import protections under the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, and several agricultural leaders said Calderon’s initiative would only hurt national producers.
Calderon, a conservative elected in 2006, also said a quota of beans would be imported tax-free and duties on powdered milk would be slashed by half. Tariffs will also end for sorghum and soy pasta.
“We will not allow the poorest families to pay the consequences of a situation created beyond our borders,” he said.
The president promised several measures to help farmers, including modernizing irrigation systems for 214,000 hectares by the end of the year. He said that would be three times faster than the current rate of 60,000 hectares per year.
Calderon said the government would abolish duties on nitrogen fertilizer and chemicals needed to manufacture fertilizer.
And he promised a preferential credit system to help about 500,000 small farmers buy fertilizer and pay after the harvest.
Mexico’s consumer prices rose 4.55 percent in the 12 months ending last month, led by the cost of tomatoes, chicken, bread, avocados, plantains and cooking oil. It was the biggest inflation increase since 2005. Last year, tortilla prices doubled, in part because of the US ethanol boom, provoking street protests.
On Sunday, farm groups accused Calderon of offering only short-term solutions that would do little to help consumers and would hurt producers.
“The government is making emergency imports, but its policy is not accompanied by a serious reflection of the failure of Mexican agriculture,” said Margarito Montes Parra, secretary-general of the General Union of Workers and Peasants.
Small farmers have long complained about dwindling government support programs such as state purchasing agencies and distribution networks.
The paramount chief of a volcanic island in Vanuatu yesterday said that he was “very impressed” by a UN court’s declaration that countries must tackle climate change. Vanuatu spearheaded the legal case at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, which on Wednesday ruled that countries have a duty to protect against the threat of a warming planet. “I’m very impressed,” George Bumseng, the top chief of the Pacific archipelago’s island of Ambrym, told reporters in the capital, Port Vila. “We have been waiting for this decision for a long time because we have been victims of this climate change for
MASSIVE LOSS: If the next recall votes also fail, it would signal that the administration of President William Lai would continue to face strong resistance within the legislature The results of recall votes yesterday dealt a blow to the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) efforts to overturn the opposition-controlled legislature, as all 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers survived the recall bids. Backed by President William Lai’s (賴清德) DPP, civic groups led the recall drive, seeking to remove 31 out of 39 KMT lawmakers from the 113-seat legislature, in which the KMT and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) together hold a majority with 62 seats, while the DPP holds 51 seats. The scale of the recall elections was unprecedented, with another seven KMT lawmakers facing similar votes on Aug. 23. For a
Taiwan must invest in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to keep abreast of the next technological leap toward automation, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) said at the luanch ceremony of Taiwan AI and Robots Alliance yesterday. The world is on the cusp of a new industrial revolution centered on AI and robotics, which would likely lead to a thorough transformation of human society, she told an event marking the establishment of a national AI and robotics alliance in Taipei. The arrival of the next industrial revolution could be a matter of years, she said. The pace of automation in the global economy can
All 24 lawmakers of the main opposition Chinese Nationalists Party (KMT) on Saturday survived historical nationwide recall elections, ensuring that the KMT along with Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) lawmakers will maintain opposition control of the legislature. Recall votes against all 24 KMT lawmakers as well as Hsinchu Mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) and KMT legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崐萁) failed to pass, according to Central Election Commission (CEC) figures. In only six of the 24 recall votes did the ballots cast in favor of the recall even meet the threshold of 25 percent of eligible voters needed for the recall to pass,
RSS