Implications of World Trade

Dr. Renu Khator employed her expertise as Director of the Environmental Science and Policy Program at the University of South Florida to address the positive and negative aspects of globalization at the convention lunch. She said that world trade has both ethical and environmental implications. For example, trade affects the economic growth of a country, as well as its environmental footprint on the globe, and its consideration of human rights and welfare. In 1995 the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) became the World Trade Organization (WTO). This organization presently has 134 members, and thirty more are making application for membership. Of these, 98 are developing countries. A positive result of this is that democracy in these areas of the world will evolve naturally, but a negative impact will be the promotion of materialistic interests that undermine human ethics. Also, countries will likely relax environmental standards in order to attract trade. People will migrate to already sensitive areas in order to get jobs. Natural resources will be wasted, including the most vital: water. There will follow violent conflict over ownership of environmental resources. Environmental colonialism will affect human rights and result in the flight of refugees from big-business oppression.

It is a logistical reality that the world cannot support a large population if all require a high standard of living. If the world could be satisfied to have the standard of living of Bangladesh, it would support a population of 10 billion. But at the standard of living of America, it would not support more than 4.7 billion. The current world population exceeds 6 billion.

Culture conflict is another problem inherent to globalism. Even well intentioned ideas sometimes backfire if a donor culture fails to understand the value system of the recipients. Dr. Khator told of an Indian village that received the philanthropic gift of a well, located in the middle of the village. The women were accustomed to walking five miles carrying heavy pots of water each day. It turned out that the new well was not used because the women preferred to gossip and socialize as they walked together. When one of them spread the rumor that a ghost lived in the well, its use was discontinued.

The speaker stated that for the short term, standards of living can be raised by foreign investment/exploitation, but this creates a dependency on foreign companies that compromises human rights and dignity and can have a catastrophic impact on a community if a company moves its operation somewhere else.

Richard Atkins

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