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GENEVA: Crucial World Trade Organization talks inched forward in
overnight talks but rich and poor countries now face a race against
time to resolve their differences to resolve the seven-year round.
Negotiators say talks on the industrial products
sector were slowing progress, and many issues remained unresolved.
Argentine negotiator Nestor Stancanelli said
before heading into Thursday’s talks that “big differences”
remained, particularly in industrial products.
While the draft text for discussion on
agriculture reflected key concerns of most countries, that of the
industrial products “failed to take in considerations of many
countries,” he explained.
The so-called “G6+1” group of the United
States, European Union, Japan, India, Brazil, Australia and China
were in locked in marathon talks last night until shortly before 4
a.m. (0200GMT) this morning.
But little was resolved.
“There is progress but not enough,” said
India’s Trade Minister Kamal Nath after the talks.
“We are making progress on sensitive products,
(tariff) capping, many issues, but there is still some heavy lifting
to be done,” he told reporters.
The “G6+1” talks were convened by WTO head
Pascal Lamy on Wednesday after he warned members that progress had
only been modest since talks began Monday.
Emerging and developed countries have slipped
into a familiar pattern of demanding new moves from each other, with
the success of this week’s high-profile gathering hinging on
whether they can find common ground.
The round began in the Qatari capital Doha seven
years ago with the aim of helping poor countries take advantage of
the freer global flow of goods and services, but has since been
delayed by as developed and developing nations refused to give
ground over subsidies and tariffs for farm and industrial products.
The European Union’s chief negotiator Peter
Mandelson said he was slightly more positive in some respects after
overnight meeting.
“After a great deal of very hard work some
issues are nearer a solution, other issues are clearer and better
understood but there is some way to go before the gaps are
bridged,” Mandelson said.
“I believe that this is a moving picture and
we’ve still got a lot of frames to travel through but I believe we
shall get to the end,” he added.
Both the US and EU have made opening gambits by
offering to reduce trade-distorting assistance to their farmers and
they are now waiting for steps by developing nations to open their
markets for industrial products.
On Tuesday, Washington offered to cut its
official aid ceiling for its farmers to $15 billion a year—a move
greeted by Nath as welcome, but still inadequate.
“The first thing we must appreciate is that
the US is moving,” Nath said. “Up to now there was no movement.
The fact movement has started is a good sign.”
Nath gave no indication he would give ground on
industrial products but said he would make a “good offer on
services”—the final component of the talks.
His failure to demonstrate flexibility on
industrial products led a spokesman for the US trade delegation,
Gretchen Hamel, to question if he was “reading from old talking
points.”
She added: “If the emerging markets don’t
contribute it will not be truly be a development round.”
Speaking in Brasilia late on Wednesday,
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said the talks would
fail unless the United States and Europe made greater concessions.
“If there is no effective reduction in
subsidies in the United States, and if there is no flexibilization
of the agriculture market by the Europeans, there will be no
deal,” he told reporters.
In that case, “each one will have to assume
his responsibilities, and each one will have to reap what he
sows,” he said.
French Agriculture Minister Michel Barnier also
gave a gloomy assessment of the state of play in titanic efforts at
the WTO to thrash out a global trade-opening deal, in remarks on
Thursday.
“I don’t see any light...on the horizon
between extremely contradictory interests,” he told French LCI
radio.
Emerging countries had to make reciprocal
proposals to match offers by advanced countries, he said referring
to tense efforts in Geneva to reach an outline agreement on a World
Trade Organization trade deal called the Doha Round.
France is an influential player in the position
taken by the European Union and has a long record of taking a hard
line to protect European Union arrangements to help EU agriculture.
Barnier said: “The European Union has made
very great efforts, notably in making proposals for its agriculture,
and we are looking for reciprocity from big emerging countries such
as Brazil and China, and we are seeing nothing in the offing.”
He said: “We are waiting for China, Brazil and
India on the other hand to open their industrial markets. What we
are seeking is a matter of equity.”
The European Union would not accept a one-sided
deal, he warned.
-- AFP
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