GENEVA:
WORLD TRADE negotiators will try from today to do in three months what they have failed to do in more than three years and clinch a deal to free up global trade, according to a Reuters report.
The World Trade Organisation's (WTO) Doha Round, launched in 2001, missed its end-2004 target date for conclusion, and member states will now try to wrap up most of the hard bargaining by the time ministers meet in Hong Kong in mid-December.
A pact could inject more than $500 billion a year into the world's economy and lift millions out of poverty, according to economists, but the talks are locked in wrangling over subsidies and opening markets for goods ranging from farm products to services such as telecommunications and tourism.
"The Doha Development Round is teetering on the brink of collapse," said CARICOM's ministerial spokesperson for the WTO and Guyana's Trade Minister Hon. Clement Rohee, who this week gave an assessment of the state of affairs in global trade talks.
WTO negotiations face a daunting challenge, ahead of a key ministerial at year's end. Momentum from last year's so-called July Package was all but stymied two months ago, when negotiators came up short in clinching an interim agreement for WTO Doha Round talks, referred to as 'First Approximations'.
Director-General of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (RNM), Ambassador Dr. Richard Bernal said, "Concerns of developing countries have not been taken into account, to the extent that we had expected, nor has the approach to the incorporation of developmental issues been balanced."
UNRESOLVED ISSUES
Minister Rohee said, "The sticky unresolved issues continue to be market access, a formula for tariff cuts in both farm and industrial goods, as well as ensuring greater disciplines in the level of domestic supports (subsidies). The key areas of contention are: i) agreeing to a tariff reduction formula with S&D provisions for farm products; ii) settling a tariff reduction formula with S&D provisions for industrial goods; iii) development of a critical mass in services and rules; and, iv) an acceptable reflection of the development dimension of the Doha mandate."
For their part, Caribbean countries want a Doha development agenda that seeks to advance their core development mandate. In this vein, the region is particularly keen on seeing adequate provisions for preferences and special tariff reduction treatment for developing countries, depending on their capacity to contribute to the Round, and for Small Economies.
The issue of preferential market access remains critically important for CARICOM. Delivering an address under the theme: Strengthening Regionalism: A Catalyst for the survival of Small States, at the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America (ECLAC) Headquarters on August 30, Jamaican Prime Minister Hon. P.J. Patterson emphasised that "Jamaica and its CARICOM partners, while mindful of the demands of the current trading environment, remain resolute in our position, that measures must be found to mitigate the negative impact of the loss of preferential market access."
CARICOM is of the view that the Hong Kong ministerial can be successful only if the concerns of the developing countries are taken on board. Minister Rohee has cautioned that, "Unfortunately, to date this is not the case. For example, out of the sixty remaining agreements - specific proposals on Special and Differential Treatment (S&DT) from the eighty-eight that went to Cancun, only five proposals have been given priority and discussed, but not yet agreed."
What happens over the next two months in Geneva-based negotiations will be a litmus test for the Hong Kong ministerial's success. Without swift consensus on respective troubled areas, agriculture included, there could be another Cancun-type meeting this December, some WTO watchers have warned.
