Sugar reforms are a matter of simple justice

THE Unites States did the World Trade Organisation’s quest for subsidy-free and open markets no favours when it put import tariffs on imported steel to protect jobs in its own backyard.

Those who take the Jesuitical view argue that, under WTO rules, states have the right to take protective action in their own backyards when they believe good reason exists.

However, the backdrop to all of this was the growing demand by the US for the rest of the world to open up their doors to US goods and the goods of its allies such as Canada and other major grain and dairy-producing nations such as Australia and New Zealand.