By Gustavo Capdevila
GENEVA, May 25 2004 (IPS)

The World Trade Organisation negotiations are now occurring in a climate of civility, but results are taking a long time to emerge and the fate of the "Doha Round" remains in danger, negotiators from developing countries said Tuesday.

In discussions three years ago about access to low-cost medicines for the populations of poor countries, particularly in Africa, there were moments of heated debate.

Tensions have also heightened when the WTO agenda has included some aspect of farm trade liberalisation or issues related to geographical indicators (for products identified with the town or region where they are produced), noted Alfredo Chiaradía, Argentina’s chief negotiator.

But today it seems that the internal climate of the multilateral trade institution is different. The delegates from practically all of the WTO’s 147 member states have taken a constructive attitude towards trade talks, with an eye to the upcoming deadlines set for the Doha Round.

Named for the venue of the November 2001 WTO ministerial meet in the Qatari capital, this round of talks is slated to conclude at the end of this year. But before that – by the end of July – the member states will have to finalise the modalities of the negotiations, and for agricultural trade in particular, as it is the thorniest of the issues on the Doha Round agenda.

Here is where courtesy – which in these moments infuses all WTO debate – does not seem to be enough. What is needed is a greater effort towards compromise by certain participants, say representatives of civil society groups tracking the trade talks.

The United States and EU, along with Japan and a few other industrialised countries constitute the bloc that is seen as obstructing the liberalisation of agricultural trade demanded by developing countries.

Carlo Trojan, the EU’s lead negotiator at the WTO, said the June meetings on farm trade – the first and last week of next month – will be crucial.

WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi said Tuesday about the state of the negotiations: "The atmosphere and political environment in which we are working today have clearly changed."

The trade talks "will no doubt be further influenced by upcoming ministerial gatherings, such as those of the African Union in Kigali and the APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) countries meeting in Chile," Supachai said as the symposium on multilateralism got under way.

But the WTO chief also warned against over-confidence. "We are still faced with a number of very real and complex difficulties," he said, and predicted that if the member states "fail to seize this opportunity, we run the risk of losing the rest of this year, as well as most of 2005."

The president of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers, Jack Wilkinson, agrees with Supachai’s viewpoint, adding that it would be "very difficult to find the appropriate wording" for a farm trade agreement before the U.S. presidential elections in November.

Not only do the WTO-led multilateral negotiations face obstacles. EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy admitted that the free trade pact being negotiated between the European bloc and Mercosur (Southern Common Market – Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay) would not be finalised in the near future.

Lamy said Tuesday in Geneva that the agreement with Mercosur could be taken up again in October, but that the offers of the four South American partners in that bloc were not yet comparable to those the Europeans have put on the table.

Representatives from non-governmental groups taking part in the three-day symposium here wonder how WTO negotiations can be successful if regional deals – in which the same WTO countries are participating – are also stalling.

Brazil, as coordinator of the G20, the group of developing countries also led by China, India and South Africa, plays a key role in the WTO agricultural talks, and in the regional trade negotiations between the EU and Mercosur.

Lamy said that the EU is now awaiting a response from the G20 and the Cairns Group, made up of 17 agricultural exporting countries that are opposed to subsidies and other forms of farm protectionism.

The G20 and Cairns have promised to present a proposal in the next few weeks on market access for farm products, particularly tariffs on imports.

Argentina’s agriculture minister, Miguel Santiago Campos, said during the WTO symposium that the G20 and Cairns are considering alternatives that take into account the interests of the industrialised countries as well as the issue of special and differentiated treatment demanded by developing countries.

But the formula for market access must remain based on rational, broadly accepted criteria for a bigger cut in the highest tariffs, eliminating the existing tariff peaks, said Campos.

An illustrative case of high tariffs is the 400 percent that Japan levies on rice imports to protect its own rice farmers.

The Argentine official called for farm trade liberalisation, saying a privileged group can no longer be permitted to benefit from the status quo, while limiting the possibility for an enormous portion of the world population to improve their lot in life.

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