The Hindu Business Line : Optimism on Doha Round

ON HIS VISIT last week to New Delhi, the WTO Director-General, Mr Supachai Panitchpakdi, exuded optimism over the Geneva negotiations on agriculture. He hoped the talks — to finalise a draft framework to be placed before the WTO General Council meeting at end-July — would be fruitful, so that the Doha Round of negotiations remains on schedule. While everyone wants this, paving the way for the Doha Development Agenda, the chances of its happening are rather low. Mr Panitchpakdi hoped the differences among members would narrow to a point where some consensus would emerge, salvaging the Doha Round. But the chairman of the Committee on Agriculture admitted frankly, at the start of the Geneva meeting, that he was "nowhere near ready" to producing a draft, and that while there had been "considerable progress" politically, it was "still maturing" at the negotiators' level.

Normally, one would expect politicians to call the shots because they run governments of which negotiators are a part. This would mean that if a political decision is taken to agree to a framework draft, the negotiators would have no choice but to push that line. Against this background, if the negotiations are not taking off the way they should, it can only mean the politicians are saying one thing to the public and quite another to their officials. In recent weeks made public were "concessions" by some of the majors such as the US and the EU that raised hopes of early finalisation of a draft framework agreement. Thus, in early May, the EU Trade Commissioner, Mr Pascal Lamy, and the EU Agriculture Commissioner, Mr Franz Fischler, wrote a much-publicised letter to WTO member-countries announcing that the EU was ready to "show flexibility". In particular, they said that "provided we get a balanced deal on market access, domestic support and non-trade concerns and strict parallelism on export competition, we are ready to put all the export subsidies on the table... " In early June, the US came out with its position on market access, the thrust of which was to increase access for "sensitive products outside the formula," that is, through "tariff rate quota expansion".

While these and other proposals were much publicised as"initiatives," they did not help the bargaining process in Geneva. The EU concession is limited to a "willingness" to discuss the possibility of a change in its export subsidies provided countries such as Australia, the US and Canada made "matching" moves; so much for the EU "initiative". Washington's proposal was thumbed down by the G-20 (which includes Brazil, India and China) for not making any special mention of the "sensitive products," crucial to developing economies. In fact, the Commerce Minister, Mr Kamal Nath, was categorical that New Delhi would not budge from its position seeking protection for its 650 million farmers. Specifically, India is keen on protection for the 70-odd sensitive tariff lines; this has to be guaranteed by the developed economies (including the farm products exporting Cairns Group which supports the G-20 on many issues) and may not come easily. New Delhi's tough stance is justified and hopefully it will not recede from its position on the ground that some progress has to be made in the Doha Round whose deadline is nearing.

More Stories on : Editorial | WTO | Agriculture

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Indo-Pak dialogue — Moving towards a new dynamic

A case for equitable employment practice

Optimism on Doha Round

Budget 2004-05: Dipping into new resource streams

GDP: Don't count on it

Too many cooks

Whose interest is it anyway?

Not by credit alone