new world order revisited

I'm sort of surprised with the G8 debt relief plan for poor nations. Happily surprised, and a general thumbs up for UK finance minister Gordon Brown and his colleagues. Dept relief in return for health, teachers and infrastructure seems like a good idea. I can't help to be suspicious though. Trying to look for catches I turned to the radical Norwegian newspaper Klassekampen. And yes, they do frame it somewhat differently focusing on how Highly Indepted Poor Countries (HIPC) have been following a tight reform-program to qualify for dept relief. BBC also provides good background: "To qualify, countries have to be very poor and have a very heavy debt burden. They also have to maintain economic stability and produce a strategy for reducing poverty."

Reform-programs are a good thing as long as you see liberalization and privatization as fortunate. The major challenge is of course the next step: creating fair trade-conditions in the world, including poor countries in the globalized world trade system.

Free trade between Southern and Northern countries? Can't be a good thing for our environment, can it? I read a rather interesting article in Framtiden i våre hender's (The Future in our hands) journal yesterday though. Importing tomatoes from the other side of the world is more friendly to our planet than producing our own in this part of the world. Framtiden i våre hender are pro-environmentalist and pro fair-trade. Simultaneously. Buy fair-trade when you can!