TRADE: WTO Ministers Left Without Script for Seattle Conference

By Gustavo Capdevila Reprint | | Print |

Gustavo Capdevila

GENEVA, Nov 23 1999 (IPS) - The entrenched differences among international negotiating teams have led to the failure of preparations for the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) Third Ministerial Conference and threaten to ruin the chances for a new round of international trade talks.

After nearly 15 months of preparations, WTO officials admitted Tuesday that they had not reached a consensus on the draft declaration to be submitted to the ministerial conference, which will be held in the US city of Seattle, Washington, November 30 through December 3.

Debates on the draft document failed because negotiators could not reach an agreement on implementing previous accords or on agricultural issues, according to the officials.

WTO General Council president Ali Mchumo, of Tanzania, commented that a draft declaration that does not include implementation measures or agricultural issues cannot be considered a balanced document.

Though world trade experts predicted this outcome months ago, several negotiators expressed their disappointment, as well as fear that the Seattle conference will meet the same fate.

Rita Hayes, head of the US delegation to the WTO, said, “I’m very disappointed and I’m sure the rest of the representatives here are too.”

Federico Cuello, negotiator from the Dominican Republic, declared his frustration with the “resounding failure” of discussions on the draft ministerial declaration.

An official communique from an ad hoc group of developing countries, which includes approximately 90 of the 135 WTO member countries, pointed out that the stalled negotiations did not exclusively follow North-South divisions.

Large cracks developed during the talks between industrialised nations, according to the ad hoc group, referring to differences on agricultural issues that separated the four major trade powers – with the United States and Canada on one side, and the European Union (EU) and Japan on the other.

Canada and 14 other agricultural exporting countries make up the Group of Cairns, which has established an alliance with the United States to promote the liberalisation of agricultural trade.

In contrast, Europe and Japan, with South Korea, Norway and Switzerland, are fighting to maintain protectionist measures that favour their agricultural producers.

The communique emphasises the developing countries’ rejection of agricultural export subsidies applied by the EU-led bloc and, to a lesser extent, by the United States.

But the communique’s strongest criticism was directed at industrialised countries for ignoring, throughout the WTO discussions, the issue of implementing the Uruguay Round accords, which were negotiated from 1986 to 1994.

The ad hoc group’s spokesman, Alejandro de la Peña, from Mexico, stated that the developing countries’ declaration constitutes a call for all parties to demonstrate greater flexibility in the negotiations to begin next week in Seattle.

WTO Council president Mchumo and WTO Director-General, New Zealander Mike Moore, were both confident that such a flexible attitude will predominate at the ministerial conference.

From the beginning of the Seattle process, the industrialised countries have raised expectations that the conference’s final declaration would include approval for convening a new round of trade talks to deepen the economic liberalisation process.

The United States has come out in favour of a new round with limited agenda items, generally focussing on markets for new technologies where it would have a dominant presence.

The EU and its agricultural allies, meanwhile, want a new round of talks with a much broader agenda, one that includes a variety of issues that can be exchanged as concessions in the inevitable agricultural debate.

The bloc of developing countries wants the conference to ensure the implementation of the Uruguay Round’s pending issues, because non-compliance deprives the poorest countries of trade benefits. Only after there is an agreement on implementation will they accept a new round of talks, but with a very limited agenda.

In just a few days, the ministers gathering in Seattle will have to decide if there is enough consensus on any one of these agenda variations to convene of a new round of negotiations.

Under Tuesday’s cloud of disappointment, which spread as the failure of the draft declaration grew evident, some negotiators pointed out that there would be a margin for negotiating agricultural and service sector issues after the Seattle conference.

The Marrakesh accords, which closed the Uruguay Round, included the approval of an agenda that mandates the renegotiation of agricultural and service sector issues beginning in the year 2000.