Whither the euro?

[El Pibe]

well as we know paying higher prices for food is pretty devastating as we're finding out here where food bills in low-middle income households are seeing high percentages of disposable income eroded by these price rises, mostly from foodstuffs outside of the EU, ie beyond their control.

And carter, the evidence seems to CAP standing for copy and paste, poor effort.

But you're not wrong that there are things that need subsantial reform in the CAP, but the real lesson is that shielding a large internal market from the whims of the market can be incredibly successful in guaranteeing (in this case) food security and ensuring supplies across the market despite failures in localised parts of it.

It's the old bundle of straws analogy innit, stronger together.

Yes I got the point huguenot, maybe I should have said 'score one for multinational cooperation in a supranational legislative structure' rather than 'score one for europe', just to be clear ;)

[acm]

So let me get this right?

Without trying to sound to hyperbolic here, you would choose to inflict poverty, famine and death on another continent rather than pay free market prices for food, even if those prices rise (or fall) on a temporary basis due to localised market conditions, such as a wet summer in Norway? Out of sight, out of mind, eh?

"...shielding a large internal market from the whims of the market can be incredibly successful in guaranteeing (in this case) food security..."

Isn't that pretty much the definition of protectionism, on a continental scale?

Then every few years we get twats like Geldof or Bono telling us of the suffering in places like Ethiopia or Somalia. Well yes, thanks for that. Really we should know already because we are helping to fucking create it.

It sickens me to the core.

So lets drag this back on topic. Whither the Euro?

As $deity$ is my witness, I bloody well hope so. Because then we have the greatest chance yet to be rid of the cancerous, murderous, wealth-destroying, self-serving and self-preserving parasite that is the EU and then all the people of Europe and beyond will be freer and better off as a result.

And Huguenot? I am anti-EU, not anti-Europe.

Please learn the fucking difference.

[Marmora Man]

To the contrary Marmora Man - the essence of this debate is facts, figures and the propensity of the anti-Europe brigade to deliberately misrepresent and misuse them in pursuit of a destructive hidden agenda.

Your own anti-European position is well established, and I reserve the right to ignore instructions from you to shut up as the right wingers continue a campaign of misinformation in the national press and on people's doorsteps.

Hugenot - you always get very het up it when others, allegedly, put words into your mouth. You have put words in mine; I challenge you to find my "well established anti-European position" - because I damned if I can remember ever posting one. I might have, in passing, made comments about the illogicality of the creation of a common currency before securing common fiscal polices but I am most definitely not an Anti European.

[Huguenot]

And you ask me why I accuse people of prejudice? This says it all:

Because then we have the greatest chance yet to be rid of the cancerous, murderous, wealth-destroying, self-serving and self-preserving parasite that is the EU

Patently unsubstantiated, ridiculous, prejudiced rubbish.

[El Pibe]

You're right acm, it is a form of protectionism but not the one you're thinking of.

This isn't about protecting the market from competition like the Norweigan version, this is about guarateeing production by innoculating famers from the wilder fluctuations in the global market.

Like the Norweigans we actually do all pay a little bit extra, but this time in order to guarantee we don't have shortages by stabilising prices. Norway hasn't done that as now they're paying a fortune for their butter!

The reason is about food security, something Britain really needs to understand because we, simply put in words of two syllables or less, cannot feed ourselves.

Gone are the days when we could sow the lands of empire with wheat, guaranteeing our bread whilst Indians and Irish starved by their millions, hell, we don't even get preferential treatment from the commonwealth anymore.

So I'm curious as to your solution for this once the cancer of Europe is excised from Britain. You'd ether kill britons in the fools errand of 'independence' or you'd kill fuzzy-wuzzies by harking back to the glory days of empire and all those lovely plantations. Or maybe we can depend on cheap imports of wheat and rice from China, tha'd be sensible.

Forgive me if I'll take your 'sick to the core' for the plight of africans at the hands of EU dumping with a pinch of salt.

Britain practically invented doing well at the cost of the poor, we have a foreign office that likes to keep strongmen, usually educated here, in power, we sell weapons to these terrible people and push a globalisation agenda that kills far more people than a bit of cheap EU sugar* ever will.

But yes, dumping is bad and should stop, however food security in an increasingly unstable and competitive world is of paramount importnace, now as much as in the post-war world. Thankfully our politicians understand (or are made to understand) this. I'd love to see Farage get into power only to be told the hard truths "sorry Nige old chap, we simply can't survive on our own, simple as that; another brandy?'.

Anyway this seems to have moved on from the Euro, but probably because the Euro crisis is being exploited by eurosceptics with an anti EUrope agenda, much like here really.

*It's also interesting that no african nation took the EU to task at the WTO, it was Brazil and Australia annoyed we were undercutting their prices!

[silverfox]

El Pibe, I take your point about the potential problem of food scarcity in the coming years and that the lessons of the Great Depression of the '30s is that protectionism is not the way to go.

I also recognise the distinction between the EU and the Euro but understand why people are starting to use the terms interchangeably. And the reason for this is that the logic of the Merkozy proposal for greater political and fiscal integration to shore up the Eurozone and prevent further contagion is itself blurring the EU/Euro distinction.

If we go back to basics, and I'm allowed to simplify the workings of the EU with a bit of help from Wikipedia, we can state it thus:

The EU operates through a hybrid system of supranational independent institutions and intergovernmentally made decisions negotiated by the member states.

By acceding to the treaties the 27 members of the EU have pooled their sovereignty in exchange for representation in the institutions. The EU operates solely within those competencies conferred on it upon the treaties and according to the principle of subsidiarity (which dictates that action by the EU should only be taken where an objective cannot be sufficiently achieved by the member states alone).

The first problem with the recent Merkozy summit was that to permit some of these institiutions to oversee the fiscal and budgetary policies of the 17 Eurozone members required amendment of existing treaties by all 27 members of the EU.

Such a proposal throws the principle of pooled sovereingty out of the window in that a country that can no longer set its own spending plans is no longer sovereign (in my opinion), but more of a satellite state, quasi-colonial. As such, the danger is the particular EU institutions become more powerful that the individual states.

The second problem is that the attempt to shore up the rules for the 17 Eurozone members is calling the concept of subsidiarity into question.

So, in my opinion David Cameron was correct to refuse to endorse the proposals. The matter was an ill-thought out panic measure which failed to address the immediate problem of the Euro which is that possibly as much as ?3 Trillion has to be found and put aside to rescue the Eurozone countries and meet future debt obligations. It was a recipe for institutionalised austerity for decades to come with no provisions for economic growth.

Now, whether this leaves Britain isolated to our detriment or not I'm not sure. However it does not stop us from trading with the EU as before. Nothing has changed from a trading point of view. We are still full members of the EU.

If we are now isolated, in my opinion it is a price worth paying for refusing to hand fiscal/budgetary control to others. There is an non-democratic wind blowing through the EU at the moment brought on by panic attempts to rescue the Euro and we already have two member states with non-elected technocrats running the show.

There's a bit of a whiff of totalitarianism in these panic measures if people pause for thought and consider the ramifications.

[El Pibe]

I'm inclined to agree with you on many of those points.

There is a very reactive and ill thought out element to current EU activity. It's also almost certainly too little too late, the data points to a series of defaults being imminent regardless of centralised fiscal strictures placed upon Eurozone memebers.

You can't blame the Germans frankly, they've seen other members fritter away their money and are basically telling them they can no longer be trusted with Germany's cash. Fair dues.

Cameron was right not to commit this country to those rules, but we weren't really expected to join up anyway, plus this was a about general strategy going forward, not signing on any dotted line.

What Cameron has done though is commit the cardinal sin of using the diplomatic domesday device to absolutely no effect other than to piss of all our closest and most important allies and marginalise any influence we may have had.

Especially as the rest will carry on regardless.

As I read a commentator say somewhere 'for heaven's sake don't let him near the nuclear deterrent!!!'

Even Thatcher was far too clever to do so, and when it looked like she was moving that way, a cannier Tory party than this lot binned her.

All to play to the gallery of some hooray henries on the backbenches and a couple of favourable headlines in the Daily Mail.

Not clever.

And back briefly to the minor aside about food security and protectionism, I think I managed to get the point across that this is protecting supply, not protectionism per se, and its success is causing the EU headaches, so in terms of achieving its goals it's demonstrably effective if not neccessarily the 'right' way of going about things.

edited twice for spelling and two unforgivable grocers' apostrophes

[Otta]

Marmora Man Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Time to close this thread - it's like listening to

> two drunks arguing too late into the night after a

> boozy Christmas office party - and is getting

> boring.

>

> There is a healthy debate to be held on the

> subject but batting tennis ball facts, figures and

> insults back and forth is not adding to the sum of

> human knowledge.

Agreed. I admit that I am no expert on this stuff, it is not my satrong point. As a result, I read threads like this with interest, hoping to learn a few things. However, the last few pages have become tit for tat, and I am now rather confused.

I shall look elsewhere for some explanation.

[the-e-dealer]

Its Classic Old Gites ! (sic)

[Huguenot]

It's a bit like climate change denial.

The anti-Europe gang make all sorts of specious unsubstantiated claims that don't stand up under analysis.

They're then addressed one at a time to expose the myths.

The anti-Europe brigade then deny all the facts, poo poo all the evidence and attempt to sow confusion.

[taper]

Are they a gang or a brigade? If you cant't answer that, I'm not sure I can trust your analysis.

[Huguenot]

A good point ;-)

[taper]

can i suggest gang? So it's a health and safety brigade, anti european gang, and perhaps neocon cabal. The liberal lefties, hampstead/white wine liberal handwringers, right wing nutters and revanchist proto lysenkoists can fit around this basic taxonomy.

[acm]

"...The reason is about food security, something Britain really needs to understand because we, simply put in words of two syllables or less, cannot feed ourselves."

Actually, Something Britain really needs to understand is there is absolutely no such concept of food security. The just-in-time method as employed right now and the entire corporatisation of the food supply means unless you have stores in the larder or are prepared to slaughter the cat then, given an interruption in the supply, there is no more than three or four days of food. That has already been seen on the ground in New Orleans with Katrina.

Let's look the regulations from the EU that Huguenot is so bewitched by. Let's look at Monsanto, the owners and manipulators of the world's food supply.

Monsanto Global Food Supply

Now, Monsanto are large enough to be able to employ army's of people to comply with every crap regulation spouted from bureaucrats with no real purpose in life other than to keep themselves in a job. For example -:

Bananas must be curved - EC Commission Regulation No 2257/94 - all bananas must be "free of abnormal curvature" and at least 14 cm in length. However the provisions relating to shape apply fully only to bananas sold as Extra class; some defects of shape (but not size) are permitted in Class I and Class II bananas.

Is that clear? Good.

Now, it must be pointed out that on the 29th July 2008, the European Commission held a preliminary vote concerning the repeal of certain regulations related to the quality of specific fruit and vegetables that included provisions related to size and shape. As of 2011, the specific rules for bananas have not been repealed.

Bananas

Bless them. It's only been three years. And that's just bananas.

And do you know what really fucks me off?

Somebody, some petty little tw@t thought of this, had meetings, had consultations, no doubt a few good 8 course dinners with fine wines with "scientists" at a conference in Geneva, and then wrote this down. Somebody thought this was important.

Now, imagine the absolute bureaucratic regulatory nightmare that your average small-holding farmer, organic or otherwise, has to go through just to comply with this shit. Food is food. If it doesn't kill the person eating it, and if you can sell it then leave well alone.

Frankly its a wonder we have any farmers left at all.

Back to Monsanto.

Pigs - Greenpeace

A Greenpeace researcher who monitors patent applications, Christoph Then, uncovered the fact that Monsanto is seeking patents not only on methods of breeding, but on actual breeding herds of pigs as well as the offspring that result.

So, not only do they want to own the worlds crops, but the livestock as well. Just to help things along, Monsanto worked with the US Government to start a trade war with the EU over GM crops. Or -:

"The US embassy in Paris advised Washington to start a military-style trade war against any European Union country which opposed genetically modified (GM) crops..."

Monsanto Trade War - Guardian

A military-style trade war.

Now, the point of this rather long post.

As the biotechnocrats understand full well, mandatory GE food labels will cripple the industry: consumers will not buy gene-altered foods, farmers will not plant them, restaurants and food processors will avoid them, and grocery stores will not sell them. How can we be certain about this? By looking at the experience of the European Union, the largest agricultural market in the world. In the EU there are almost no genetically engineered crops under cultivation or GE consumer food products on supermarket shelves. And why is this? Not because GE crops are automatically banned in Europe. But rather because under EU law, all foods containing genetically engineered ingredients must be labeled.

GE Food Labels

"...Not because GE crops are automatically banned..."

Make no mistake. As soon as they take enough EU parasites out to dinner and work out how to lie - sorry, lobby - on the labeling, you will be serving this crap to your kids. It will all be glossed over with regulation, designed for and written by the big boys. You or I matter not in this world now. We currently have absolutely no influence on any of these things. As long as these decisions are removed from us and given to some faceless technocrat removed from any democratic process, then we will be continue to be fucked over.

We need to get control back. Until we do, we are truly expendable.

[taper]

EU parasites I'll not allow. It's public sector parasites. Can you use EUSSR?

[Huguenot]

It's a bit silly acm - you've argued yourself in a circle.

In your first 'banana' point you say there is too much regulation.

In your second point about patents this is not about EU regulations, just about patents in general. Nothing to do with the EU.

In your third 'GE crops' point you say there is not strong enough regulation.

It's just a rant where you're shouting about things you don't like in general, and then laying them at the door of the EU whether they're rational or relevant.

[DaveR]

"It's a bit like climate change denial.

The anti-Europe gang make all sorts of specious unsubstantiated claims that don't stand up under analysis.

They're then addressed one at a time to expose the myths.

The anti-Europe brigade then deny all the facts, poo poo all the evidence and attempt to sow confusion"

I laughed out loud at this.

Here's the BBC take on the eurozone crisis:

BBC

Not bad as far as it goes, but misses a few key things;

Spain and Italy could not have become so anti-competitive vis-a-vis Germany were it not for euro membership, which obviously precluded exchange rate changes

One of the key reasons for the low public and private borrowing costs in Spain, Italy and Greece was that euro membership was (wrongly) understood by the markets to imply some form of sovereign debt guarantee across the entire eurozone

In both Italy and Greece government borrowing is at least as big a problem as private borrowing. Italian public debt may not have increased substantially between 2000 and 2010 but it didn't need to; it was already over 100% of GDP

Just like climate change denial.

My a$se.

[Huguenot]

It's when you start adding unsubstantiated assertions that it gets all distorted with you DaveR:

"Spain and Italy could not have become so anti-competitive vis-a-vis Germany were it not for euro membership, which obviously precluded exchange rate changes "

Southern nations became less competitive because they had wage inflation in booming economies, whilst Germany kept this under control.

If you argue that only the Euro could have allowed these economies to boom then the 'evidence is staring you in the face' as you once said - the UK is not a member of the Euro and yet it too had an economic boom throughout the same period.

As you mention, some of those national debts exceeded GDP before the Euro was introduced - in other words the Euro was not necessary to create the debt crisis.

The UK is also not in the Euro and has its own debt problems.

QED Whilst the Euro has its flaws, you can't going laying the blame for the debt burden or uncompetitive economies simply on the Euro.

[DaveR]

"It's when you start adding unsubstantiated assertions that it gets all distorted with you DaveR:

"Spain and Italy could not have become so anti-competitive vis-a-vis Germany were it not for euro membership, which obviously precluded exchange rate changes "

Southern nations became less competitive because they had wage inflation in booming economies, whilst Germany kept this under control."

See the words in bold. Wage inflation is a domestic factor, competitiveness is an international one. Spanish workers being paid more pesetas would not have translated into a loss of competitiveness compared to Germany because those pesetas would not have enabled them to buy any more BMWs, because the peseta would have lost value compared to the DM. That's what happened before the euro.

H, I'm surprised you don't understand this - don't you run a business?

[Huguenot]

The Euro certainly takes away the option of devaluation as a blunt economic tool - I've commented upon this passim, and agree that it limits flexibility.

But then an inflationary/devaluation strategy by any government should equally be dismissed as a strategy for economic mismanagement. Check with Zimbabwe.

It's uncontrolled and prone to meltdown.

Zimbabwe wasn't a subsucriber to the Euro ;-)

[DaveR]

It's not a question of strategy - devaluation presupposes deliberate action, but I'm talking about market correction, which is what would have happened if Germany and Spain had had independent, floating currencies. You just don't get it, do you? All that pontificating but you have so little understanding of how financial and capital markets actually work.

[Huguenot]

Oh get a grip you wally. I invest a lot of time trying to share ideas with readers here, it's not pontificating. I work hard to find data or references to support these perspectives, and make sure that people don't have to suffer loud mouthed dross.

If people want to hear a lot of opinionated cock they can hear it down the pub.

I clearly 'get' it, I just don't agree with your interpretation, and plenty of your views are simply prejudice.

Why don't you put your ego down, take your hand out of your trousers and contribute something worth reading?

[DaveR]

H, I'm genuinely sorry that you don't understand the difference between devaluation as a governmental tool, and the interrelationship between comparative productivity and exchange rates, because it means that we have been talking at cross purposes all this time.

Read and enjoy:

Economics 101 - exchange rates

[Huguenot]

Yo! The Fed!

And the problem with that is tulips.

We've got tulips all over this, and we need to be bright enough to see it.

[acm]

Meanwhile, in the real world...

"I invest a lot of time trying to share ideas with readers here, it's not pontificating. I work hard to find data or references to support these perspectives, and make sure that people don't have to suffer loud mouthed dross."

This is your loud mouthed dross.

Africans, 2$ per day. European cows, 2$ per day

Relief Web

Europe Today - How EU policies could address Africa?s food security

The structural adjustment policies imposed on many poor countries in Africa by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were accused of having destroyed the public services that provided rural support and of making developing countries dependent on international market forces. The European Union?s policy, in other words its Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was seen as subsidising European agricultural production while its development aid policies largely ignored the importance of agriculture.

How many more references do you want me to provide?

Short of dragging people straight over there?

The EU, the CAP, and its policies are killing people.

Merry Christmas. It still sickens me to the core.

El Pibe? You want to take my feelings and experiences with a "pinch of salt"? Frankly, and I know this is not exactly decorum, but **** ***. Having seen people die on first hand terms, it is something I want no further hand in.

Again, Merry Christmas to you all.

Ho, ho, ho.

*Edited for language. Apologies to all - Huguenot was correct i.e. drunk in charge of a keyboard.