Round The World

New Delhi, 18 July 2017

G20 Summit

WIN SOME, LOSE SOME

By Dr D K Giri

(Visiting Prof, International Politics, JMI)

India perhaps is finally being noticed by the big powers. For the first time, it smartly played its part and secured a sort of diplomatic victory at the recent G20. It managed to insert an anti-terrorism objective for the member countries, much to the chagrin of China. The target was obviously Pakistan which has been fostering terrorist outfits.   

The final communiqué stated; “Terrorism is a global scourge that must be fought and terrorist safe havens eliminated in every part of the world”. Furthermore, the G20 leaders at Hamburg pledged joint crackdown on terrorism and its financing; vowed to destroy safe havens in every part of the world. Prime Minister Modi managed to insert this clause through his deft diplomacy with German Chancellor and host Angela Merkel. Remember, terrorism seldom figures in meetings where India and China are present, as the latter has sympathy and support for Pakistan.

The G20, by far is the most powerful bloc, as the economic output of members constitutes 85 per cent of the world GDP. It started in the 70s as G7, consisting of seven largest economic powers at the time – Canada, France, (West) Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The Group emerged in response to the spikes in prevailing food and fuel prices. Its composition remained unchanged until Russia joined in 1996 when it became G8. In the late 90s, the financial crises affected a number of emerged economies in Latin America and Asia and threatened to spill over to the G-8 countries. That is when the eight countries began to expand.

After some experimentation in including other countries, a solid structure of G20 countries got finalised. So far, 12 summits of G20 countries have taken place from 2008 to 2017. The original aim of G20 was, ‘to provide a new mechanism for informal dialogue achieve stable and sustainable world economic growth that benefits all’ (Canada, 1999). Since then, the objective has been broadly to manage world economy in response to emerging issues, but many new agendas such as dealing with climate change, managing globalization have been included.

This time, the discussion and decisions were made under five rubrics. First, ‘sharing the benefits of globalisation’, wherein, it was agreed that it has led to excessive global imbalance which needs to be reduced. Truly, globalisation and technology have led to economic growth, but these have not benefitted all within and across the countries. Therefore, G-20 resolved to focus on sustainable, balanced and inclusive growth. And that trade and investment should aim at increasing productivity, creating jobs, fighting protectionism, entering into plurilateral agreements, making WTO open, consistent, transparent and so on.

It was decided to create a ‘sustainable global supply chains’. In doing so, countries must adhere to UN guiding principles on business and human rights and ILO declarations on multinational enterprises and social policies -- eliminate child labour, forced labour, human trafficking, ensure decent work, and reform labour markets. The final communiqué reiterated: “Well-functioning labour markets contribute to inclusive and cohesive societies, and resilient economics. Another significant emphasis was to harness digitisation. There is digital divide in income, age, geography and gender and must be done away with. G20 members agreed to aim for a digitally connected economy and society by 2025.

The second head was ‘building resilience’. Under this objective, the tasks include: maintaining a resilient global financial system, monitoring and mending the international financial architecture, encouraging international tax co-operation and financial transparency, adopting pro-growth tax policies, and safeguarding against health crises, and strengthening the health systems. The third objective was ‘improving sustainable livelihoods’. This was aligned with the 2030 global agenda for sustainable development based on the 17 SDGs and 169 targets firmed up in Ethiopia in 2015.

There was also reference to and reiteration of the OECD report, ‘Investing in climate and investing in growth’. Combating climate insecurity, reducing GHG emissions, shifting to the use of renewable energies are the keys to sustainable livelihoods. ‘Building on all other treaties’ was the fourth agenda. The treaties referred to are related to women empowerment, education, and entrepreneurship, especially of women, food security, water, rural youth, and agriculture and so on. On women empowerment, the 2014 Brisbane Agreement was invoked.

It aimed at reducing gender gap in all areas by 25 per cent by 2025. On education, there was renewed emphasis on access to STEM-science, engineering, technology and mathematics, also on ‘e-skill for girls’ initiative’. Again on women issues, a couple of more Agreements were decided to be followed up; Wefi- women entrepreneurship financing initiative, Business women’s leaders taskforce. On rural development, the Agriculture Market Information System (AMIS) was to be used efficiently, so also the G-20 initiative on Rural Youth Employment.

The Fifth agenda had a strong moral overtone that was ‘Assuming Responsibility’. The countries talked of being responsible for discrepancies, distortions and even decay in the economies and societies world over. The special focus was on Africa which is stalked by diseases, displacement, conflicts, exploitation and dictatorships etc. The Summit resolved to build the ‘Africa partnership’. That is why President of Senegal Macky Sall, who is the head of this new partnership, attended the summit.

There were discussions on migration and refugee crises, especially the latter drew greater attention as Europe has been badly hit by heavy influx of refugees. Another major issue that became part of the global responsibility is ‘fighting corruption’. The G20 invoked and pledged to conform to the UN Convention against corruption. 

However, a major deficit in the Hamburg summit was the absence of unanimity on climate change. With the US having withdrawn from the Paris Agreement, the mantle falls on Europe, as other countries continue to be big polluters like China, Australian power supply is largely coal dominated; in Canada, oil extraction from tar sands leaves heavy carbon footprints. The US position in Hamburg was to “work closely with other countries to help them access and use fossil fuels more cleanly and efficiently”.

The rest of G20 led by Germany had a different and contrasting proposal. That was “to provide affordable, reliable, sustainable, low green house gas energy systems”. The Europeans had committed to cut GHG by 40 per cent by 2030; whether that is enough is another question. The moot point, however, in the climate negotiations is the climate finance. Before withdrawing, out of $3 billion committed, the US had already paid 1 billion to the corpus fund. Similar contributions promised by countries are not forthcoming. Getting the US back on board will be a challenge. French President Macron hopes to get the US to reconsider its position. That will be a triumph of Gallic (typical French) diplomacy.

For now, India is on board with Europeans on climate change, it has conciliated on climate negotiations. Will it be called upon to play the role of a moderator in days to come? It may, nothing is certain in politics. --- INFA

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