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Nation Protocol

This protocol is drafted as a recommendation to the world as a step towards solving global poverty and hunger. Note that articles 10 through 13 which deal with the implementation of this protocol are adapted from articles 9 through 11 of the “Mission Protocol” created by Terrascope Mission 2013 (Mission Protocol).

Purpose

This protocol seeks to better focus the efforts of the nations of the world towards reducing global poverty and hunger. It calls for the alignment of all nations along the principles of the following articles. In the concern of preserving national sovereignty, the articles that follow must function foremost as a recommendation, but it is the view of Mission 2014 and the writers of this protocol that an enforceable agreement similar to this document would be a significant step towards mitigating global poverty and hunger. The articles below are not a comprehensive review of all of the solutions presented on the website. Only those solutions that were applicable to a global agreement were included.

 

Article 1: Definitions

  1. A "Developed Nation" will be understood to indicate a nation with GNI per capita greater than US$3,855 as per the World Bank Definition.
  2. A "Developing Nation" will be understood to indicate a nation with GNI per capita less than US$3,855 as per the World Bank Definition.
  3. "Value for Money" (VFM) will be understood to indicate the greatest benefit of the goods and services for the price.
  4. "Public Procurement" will be understood to indicate the process by which governments purchase goods and services from the private sector.
  5. "Nation" will be understood to indicate the state or other authoritative body with the jurisdiction and purview to act following the relevant recommendation.

 

Article 2: Price Controls, Subsidies, and Trade

  1. To promote greater global prosperity and equity through more efficient application of price controls and subsidization: (Link to Crop Subsidies Solution)
    1. Developing nations should agree to eliminate any bias against the agricultural sector in their domestic economic policies.
    2. Developed nations should agree to send economic policy advisors to developing nations to guide them in drafting relevant and effective policies on crop subsidies and price controls.
    3. Developing nations should agree to gradually eliminate subsidies in the agricultural sector as the agriculture economy becomes self-sustaining with the following qualifications.
      1. Deregulate inputs of agriculture (fertilizer, machinery, pesticides).
      2. Expand emergency subsidies and crop reserves in case of disasters.
      3. Encourage more investments in agriculture, and set up innovative crop insurance mechanisms.
      4. Allow price stabilization policies, but not so much as to curb profits of farmers/producers
  2. To promote more fair investment in agriculture globally by monitoring foreign investment: (Link to Crop Subsidies Solution)
    1. Developed nations should agree to regulate investments in foreign agriculture in developing nations by their own firms to ensure the fairness of those partnership and the sustainability of affected farm practices
    2. All nations should agree to establish an international monitoring agency within the United Nations that examines foreign investments of agriculture in developing nations to make ensure that farmers disadvantaged.
  3. To promote greater global prosperity and equity through reform of global trade: (Link to International Trade Program)
    1. Developed nations should renew their commitment to protectionism reduction. This includes tariffs, quotas, subsidies, and other measures.
    2. Protection of domestic agricultural industries (to the detriment of developing nations) should be eliminated.
    3. In recognizing that the agricultural sectors of many developed nations are heavily supported by government expenditure, a phased implementation is proposed which would allow farms to make improvements in efficiency or prepare to leave the market. All nations should agree to a ten year plan including: a ten-percent reduction in protectionism and subsidization of agriculture in developed nations should occur in the first year; then, every three years for the next nine years, a thirty-percent reduction (of the total value in 2011) should occur.
  4. To promote greater transparency and better enforcement, all nations should agree to support the addition of a regulatory council to the World Trade Organization (WTO): (Link to International Trade Program)
    1. This council will be tasked with monitoring the policies of the member nations to see that they are following the spirit and principle of WTO decisions.
    2. The council will be made up of a rotating list of fourteen member nations with geographical as well as economic diversity. Specifically, there will be two members from each of the following geographical groups: Europe; East Asia and Southeast Asia; Northern Africa, West Asia, and South Asia; Sub-Saharan Africa; South America; North America; and Australia and the Pacific Islands. There will also be an even division between developed and developing nations.
    3. The council will not function as a judiciary. It will function in an administrative capacity to bring nations that violate the principles of development-focused free-trade to account for their actions in front of the WTO at large.

 

Article 3: International Policy Database

  1. To improve the body of knowledge regarding the effects of development policies, all nations should agree to issue annual reports entitled “Foreign Policy on Agriculture and Environment” to form an aggregate International Policy Database with the following considerations. (Link to International Policy Database)
    1. The International Policy Database exists to evaluate international agricultural trade and aid for individual nations and to analyze the effects of current policies on underdeveloped countries, shall agree.
    2. Each individual report discusses the following:
      1. International trade regulations affecting the country
      2. Descriptions of current policy problems and the mechanisms behind them
      3. Policies’ effects on the local market
      4. Agricultural conditions and policy
      5. Environmental conditions and policy
      6. Connections between policy and hunger, infrastructure development, and economy
      7. A protocol for disaster management

 

Article 4: Competitive Conditional Aid and Transparency

  1. To improve the effectiveness of aid and minimize the negative effects of corruption on aid efforts, aid giving nations should agree to support a competitive system for allocating aid to developing nations on a conditional basis. (Link to Competitive Conditional Aid)
    1. The Principle of Conditional Aid should be applied with the following considerations.
      1. The conditional aid contract fundamentally depends on the cooperation of the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, Transparency International, the United Nations, and transparency committees (Article 4 section 2).
      2. Signatories of conditional aid contract must negotiate the amount of aid to be exchanged, with conditions based on goals set by a case-by-case basis. The UN and IMF will have oversight.
      3. Recipient nations that achieve goals set by donor nations will continue contracts; recipient nations that fail to reach goals set by donor nations will reevaluate contracts
    2. The Principle of Competitive Aid should be applied by the following process (Svensson).
      1. The donor party allocates an amount of money and selects several hopeful nation sharing similar characteristics
      2. Conditions are set and progress is measured over a period of time
      3. Funds are apportioned to each candidate nation, proportional to progress in the conditions.
    3. To determine if a nation should be subject to the competitive aid framework, Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index will be used as a measure.
      1. For countries with an index at or above 4.0, pure conditional aid will be applied.
      2. For countries with an index below 4.0, conditional aid will be applied based on a competitive basis.
  2. To minimize the effects of corruption and as a means of enforcing conditional aid, each nations should agree to form a functioning transparency committee within the next five years in conjunction with the World Bank. (Link to Transparency Committee)
    1. This committee will be made up of members not involved with the government or party in power with a United Nations overseer.
    2. This committee will work with the UN to train government employees in public procurement and contract management.
    3. This committee will assist the government in the procurement of public goods to maximize VFM in accordance with proper procurement guidelines.
    4. This committee will work with the Treasury to perform regular, independent, and random audits of major governmental transactions.
    5. This committee will cooperate with the World Bank to develop an electronic auditing system monitoring government spending in each step of the public procurement process, allowing most governmental transactions to happen electronically.
    6. This committee will consult with the World Bank and the UN World Food Program in the creation of a database of contractors available for work in the party. This database shall be updated with assessments of each contractor's performance, and include information on the political affiliations of each contractor.
    7. This committee will ascertain whether the values of equal treatment, non-discrimination, mutual recognition, proportionality, and transparency are observed in the selection of contractors. In the case of major projects, the selection must be reviewed by the committee before contract awarding.
  3. To minimize corrupt practices of individual officials, the transparency committee shall:
    1. Monitor the financial assets and actions of individual officials in power. The committee shall create a database of personal assets for all public servants working in the government.
    2. Create a website and reserve a hotline number to facilitates the reporting of suspicious activities by citizens. Reports shall be consolidated into a database of complaints to facilitate case evaluations.
    3. Set aside funds for monthly lotteries for citizens who report legitimate cases of suspicious activities and present convincing evidence in case reporting.
  4. To ensure that governments respond to the committee's reports and recommendations, annual assessments of performance should be issued to international agencies and major foreign aid contributors.

 

Article 5: Infrastructure, Research, and Development

  1. To promote development of infrastructure in developing nations, all nations should acknowledge the following recommendations.
    1. In order to generate revenue from multiple sources, reach a profitable size for investors, mitigate volatility in demand-risk and generate tax revenues for the Government, nations should facilitate road-to-market development paths through the integration of routes such as roads, ferries, power and water supply into a single network thereby expanding the magnitude of agricultural networks.
    2. To improve the operations and maintenance of the water process, nations should consider professionalizing irrigation asset management and introducing a neutral third-party, financially autonomous government agency such as the Water User Association. Larger-scale irrigation projects must be demand-driven to ensure market equilibrium and incentive to produce; while the credit risk must be maintained with the Government sector that capital is not charged the high commercial rates
    3. To improve cross-season storage, reduce wastage, to keep food prices from crashing when produce floods the market and to improve the raw value of the produce, nations should develop their agroprocessing sectors.
    4. To incentivize farmers to buy insurance against failing purchase agreements, reduce debt defaulting, and facilitate immediate and efficient credit transfer, parties must set up supply-chain Information Communication Technology systems that are comprehensive, easy-to-use and efficient in achieving the said purpose.
  2. Regarding research and development, nations should seek to bring research and development solutions within the purview of public-private partnerships. Recommendations as to the nature of these public-private partnerships follow. (Link to Public-Private Partnerships)
    1. Partnerships between Firms and Universities
    2. Partnerships between the agricultural/development department of the State and Firms
    3. The State wholly funding a private entity to conduct research
  3. The main objectives of the recommendations in this article are:
    1. Reduction in the pressure on public capital investment for a country’s growth and welfare
    2. Improving efficiency of organizations by a strong profit incentive
    3. Improving accountability by privatization
    4. Expediting project completion by integrating multiple projects into one mega-plan
    5. Taking advantage of specialized expertise owned by private firms and individual
    6. Relieving the Government from staffing issues and bureaucratic hurdle
    7. Ensuring that Governments still retain enough power to correct any monopoly misbehavior

 

Article 6: Health and Education

  1. Every party, to generally improve the station of developing nations and the world’s poor and in particular the need for better education, health, and social policies, shall agree to acknowledge the following recommendations.
    1. Focus on increasing quality of primary education and decreasing the gender gap
    2. Minimize school fees
    3. Apply deworming and school lunches to decrease child malnutrition
    4. Focus on maternal nutrition, especially breastfeeding

 

Article 7: Biofuels

  1. To promote economic and environmental feasibility, every nation should agree to phase out the production and usage of bio-fuels by the year 2030, through the following: (Link to Biofuels Solution)
    1. Withdrawal of ethanol subsidy programs by the year 2020, which will be cushioned by:
      1. Seed money for affected parties to enter other businesses
      2. Unemployment benefit should there be a labor market effect
    2. Dissolving legislation calling for bio-fuel components in gasoline/diesel
    3. Legislation to halt the production and usage of ethanol by xxxx. The process should be eased/enforced by:
      1. Providing incentives in the form of tax breaks/ short-term subsidies to facilitate the switch-over from ethanol production to food crops
      2. Implementing state-wide bans on biofuel usage
  2. Parties that have a proven “net benefit” in the usage/production of certain waste-based or sugarcane etc.-based biofuels could maintain or phase out their systems at a slower pace. The “net benefit” of a biofuel shall be assessed by “U.N.-Energy”, and cases should be submitted to the organization if countries wish to exempt them from the aforementioned processes of phased withdrawal, or adapt their withdrawal plan. These parties shall be exempted from the stipulations in clause 1 of this article.
  3. Parties should invest funds in energy research to offset sustainability losses incurred from phasing out bio-fuels, in avenues such as (but not limited to):
    1. Algae-based biofuel or second generation ethanol
    2. Biomass used as a source of fuel

 

Article 8: Emergency Aid

  1. To efficiently respond to disasters while avoiding trade barriers and inefficient production decisions, every nation should agree to establish regional food reserves. (Link to Regional Food Reserves)
    1. These reserves will be in the following regions: East and Southeast Asia; West Asia and North Africa; Sub-Saharan Africa; South America; Oceania; North America; and Europe;
    2. These reserves shall be managed and monitored carefully by a board of representatives from each nation in the region.
    3. These reserve should be used for emergency price stabilization when there is a significant short-term food deficit in a region.
    4. These reserves are not long-term solutions to food security and should not be used for food price stabilization in normal times. The long-term goal should be to develop sustainable, resilient agriculture in each member nation, and utilizie trade for food price stabilization.
  2. To improve the response of aid organizations and to promote the efficient usage of the regional food reserves, nations should agree to declare states of emergencies as soon as possible. They should also agree to allow the transnational monitoring agency established in Section 1, Clause ii in this Article to examine the state of agriculture in the region so that any significant food deficit can be addressed promptly and efficiently.

 

Article 9: Funding

  1. To increase the total level of funds available to the various organizations and institutions charged with implementing solutions to global poverty and hunger, nations should agree to allocate 0.7% of GDP towards global poverty reduction. Based upon the 2009 GDP of the thirty wealthiest nations by 2009 GDP per capita as per World Bank figures, this is estimated to generate roughly US$272 billion (World Bank, 2010).
  2. To further increase the total level of funds available to the various organizations and institutions charged with implementing solutions to global poverty and hunger, nations should agree to implement a tax on round-trip currency transactions on all currency markets at the level of 0.02%. This is estimated to generate an annual revenue of roughly US$30-35 billion with considerations for reduction in volume and tax evasion (Nissanke, 2003, p. 24).
    1. The currency transaction tax will be collected by the monetary and tax authorities in countries where currency exchange markets are located, and the generated revenue will be forwarded to an international fund for global hunger reduction and development.

 

Article 10: Enforcement

To ensure impartiality in food policy, the following bodies shall act as mediation and enforcement of the provisions agreed to establish:

  1. The UN as the authority over negotiations, mediation of legal conflicts between parties
  2. The regulatory council of the WTO as proposed in Article 3 Section 4 will be responsible for mediating conflicts over economic policy.
  3. This agreement extends for the duration of this protocol which shall expire on the date of signature two thousand one hundred and eleven.

 

Article 11: Body Oversight

In order to provide enforcement and meet the objective outlined in the protocol, the following bodies are established as the highest and final authority concerning the agreements within this document:

  1. All negotiations, mediations, and evaluations shall occur in the original location of ratification.
  2. The World Trade Organization shall expand its existing operations and have the authority and responsibility to oversee and regulate the international trade pertinent to food.

 

Article 12: Ratification

The process of ratification for this Protocol shall occur in the following processes:

  1. Negotiations between parties shall occur under the jurisdiction of the United Nations and World Trade Organization.
  2. In order for the protocol to be considered an international mandate, 70% of the parties participating in the negotiations must affix their signature in the appropriate area.
  3. In signing this protocol, signatories agree to the conditions outlined in Articles 3 through 10 and will proceed to ratify this protocol through the appropriate legislative or executive means of its government and political system.
  4. Ratification must occur within 12 months of signing.

 

Article 13: Amendments

In recognition of the uncertainty of determining policies that determine food sufficiency internationally, the proceeding provisions shall occur annually upon date of signing the protocol:

  1. Each signatory is entitled to submit to the secretariat and the United Nations recommendations for amending, adding, or removing provisions within this protocol; for consideration of such recommendations, each signatory must submit an appropriate and official report to the secretariat
  2. The secretariat shall evaluate the proposals and communicate the resulting text to all signatories
  3. For such any recommendation to pass and be implemented requires a majority of 70% consensus and agreement between parties
  4. Each signatory has the right of input to the amendment of the protocol that is equivalent to one vote.
  5. A conference of parties shall continue annually to evaluate international progress on global hunger and poverty reduction.

 

 

 
 
Works cited: 

(2009). Mission Protocol. Retrieved November 29, 2010, from http://igutek.scripts.mit.edu/terrascope/?page=Protocol

Nissanke, M. (2003). Revenue Potential of the Currency Transaction Tax for Development Finance: A Critical Appraisal. Retrieved November 29, 2010, from EconLit database.

Svensson, J. (2002). Why conditional aid does not work and what can be done about it? [Electronic version] Journal of Development Economics, 381-402.

World Bank. (2010, September 17). Gross domestic product (2009). Retrieved November 29, 2010, from World Development Indicators database: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/DATASTATISTICS/Resources/GDP.pdf