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5 Objectives of German Development Cooperation

As regards the substitution of MB, the objectives of German Development Cooperation reflect GTZ guidelines which include:

• conservation of the global environment and of natural resources
• reduction of health hazards, especially to those applying MB indeveloping countries
• improvement of food security worldwide through, i.a., sustainable agriculture
• support to sustainable economic development worldwide
• financing of respective projects through the German bilateral MF quota

GTZ takes a special interest in phasing out MB because of its extraordinarily high ozone-depleting potential. A further reason for GTZ's commitment in this field is the acute and chronic health hazards. It should be noted that some of the alternatives listed in chapter 3 involve similar health hazards. This is the major reason why GTZ does not favour the use of chemicals as alternatives for soil treatments (cf. 3.1.1 and 3.1.5) or of certain fumigants for commodities and structures (cf. 3.2.2, 3.3.10 and 3.4.2).

The statements and recommendations in this brochure are in line with the MP, Agenda 21 and the BMZ's political priorities.

In some instances, however, because of the urgent need to implement measures to conserve our global environment and introduce sustainable solutions for agricultural, post-harvest and quarantine problems, the recommendations go beyond the decisions of the parties to the MP. This applies especially to the smart use of the grace period for A5 countries that extends until the year 2015. This grace period has advantages as it provides additional time to implement sound alternatives but it may also bring about severe new problems that led many A5 countries to express concern about it:

1. The world market for fruit and vegetables is dominated by a few big multinational companies (distributors and supermarkets). Consumers in industrialised importing countries are becoming increasingly aware of environmental and health hazards related to agricultural production and are starting to exercise pressure on the companies to provide foodstuff produced without MB. Commodities treated with this fumigant will subsequently not be easily marketable on international markets. Recent discussions on genetically altered soya may be considered as an example to prove this point.
2. The freeze baseline for A5 countries set by the parties to the MP in 1995 has been boosted in many cases because this decision featured a freeze in 2002 based on current and future consumption (use levels from 1995 to 1998; Schafer, 1997). The consequences have been increasing sales in a number of developing countries in order to compensate for lost markets in industrialised countries. Thus, developing countries have become even more dependent on a dead end technology and progress made in industrialised countries may be completely overwhelmed.
3. Escalating cost of MB once it is banned in industrialised countries.

In this brochure, alternatives and recommendations are included that relate to quarantine and pre-shipment uses. This is meant as a contribution to the further discussion of MB uses that are currently not controlled by the MP and to its complete substitution in the future.