POOR DEAL

Since well before the World Trade Organisation's disastrous Seattle meeting last year, the world's richest economies have talked about giving the poorest a fairer deal on trade. The idea offers a chance to give a small but worthwhile boost to economic development - and to make a magnanimous gesture, at minimal cost to industrialised countries. It could also help improve the political climate after Seattle. The opportunity should be seized. Instead, it risks being squandered. US largesse consists mainly of warmed-over proposals to improve market access for African and Caribbean exporters. The proposals failed to pass Congress last year and face mounting labour union opposition. Meanwhile, powerful lobbies oppose any lowering of US trade barriers in textiles, one of the rare manufactures that poor countries are equipped to sell internationally.