By Fran Abrams BBC Radio 4's File On 4

Ms Short wanted more developing countries to sell produce in Europe

Clare Short has hit out at former government colleagues who backed "vested interests" in the sugar industry and damaged the livelihoods of some of the world's poorest farmers in the process.

The former international development secretary says she was forced to fight "a battle a day or a week" because some ministers and officials preferred to back the interests of big business rather than of the world's poor.

Ms Short, who resigned from the government last month in protest over the war with Iraq, made her comments on BBC Radio 4's File on 4 programme on the power of the European sugar industry.

"If you're seriously interested in development there's a battle a day or a week across Whitehall," she said.

Agreement blocked

"You have to battle if you want a fair world with just rules.

"There are old mindsets, and there are vested interests that all the time have to be challenged.

"Different departments have these kinds of vested interests that linger around them."

Ms Short worked during 2001 to push through full implementation of Everything But Arms, an international agreement to allow 48 "least developed" countries to sell their full range of agricultural produce to Europe.

The EU says its sugar policy helps developing countries

But the then Minister of State for Agriculture, Joyce Quin, simultaneously backed British sugar farmers and producers who lobbied hard for the measure to be slowed down.

In a letter to one opponent, Ms Quin said it was "highly unfortunate" that the impact of the proposals on European farmers had not been more fully considered.

"At a time of great difficulty in UK agriculture it would not be sensible for abrupt changes to be made... In discussions in Brussels we shall do all we can to make progress on these matters," she wrote.

Ms Short says opponents of the measure succeeded in delaying its full implementation until 2009 - after a full review of the European sugar regime, which cuts out farmers in the developing world by imposing huge import tariffs of 36 pence a kilo.

"We were hoping for progress on access to the EU market for the poorest countries so they could grow and attract inward investment.

If we did do that it was contrary to the general government policy which was to support the Everything But Arms arrangements Lord Whitty Defra

"The sugar industry in the UK started lobbying very hard. Those interests became dominant and phasing in was over a much longer period, which was against the interest of the poorer countries," she said.

Ms Quin has now left government but her successor, Lord Whitty, told File on 4 his department - which was then the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Foods but has since become the Department of Environment, Food and Regional Affairs - should not have been seen to be against the initiative.

"If we did do that it was contrary to the general government policy which was to support the Everything But Arms arrangements.

"We have always supported the development agenda which the Department For International Development has been pursuing there is no difference between them and ourselves as of now as to the medium term decisions we need."

Listen to this edition of File On 4 on BBC Radio 4 on Tuesday 10 June at 2000 BST and Sunday 15 June at 1700 BST.