The Hindu Business Line : A routine WTO Ministerial

It would be practical for the meeting to throw up ideas on how the organisation can be “toned up” to perform its functions even better than it has done in the past. It is here that India, among other members, can play a useful role.

Ranabir Ray Choudhury

The summary that the WTO Director-General, Mr Pascal Lamy, provided of the state of the Doha Round negotiations at the end of last week suggests that matters have hardly moved towards any favourable conclusion and, more importantly, the future of the Round is still mired in the gravest of complications, technical or otherwise. What this means is that the seventh Ministerial meeting of the organisation, which starts today, will hardly have anything to do with the Doha Round, although one of the themes billed for the Working Sessions has been named “Review of WTO activities, including the Doha Work Programme”.

Formally, “Overview of Activities of the WTO” has been billed as the most important subject for discussion, the official expectation being that it will “occupy most of the time of the Plenary Session”. Ministers are expected to “review the operation and functioning of the multilateral trading system and to make general statements related thereto.” On the second day, the subject in focus will be the WTO's “contribution to recovery, growth and development.”

Despite this official agenda, it would be simplistic to assume that the Doha Round negotiations will not figure in the deliberations. If anything, the WTO chief in particular will try his best to get the important delegations talking to each other at the political level — something which, admittedly, has been done many times before but without any lasting results — the objective once again perhaps being to come out with a statement underscoring the determination of the WTO members to hammer out a Doha Round by the current deadline (2010).

As everyone knows by now, a restatement of political intentions, though greatly welcome to dispel the general gloom that has enveloped the interminable negotiations, will not in any way help to further real progress in the bargaining between the rich and the poor generally and groups of countries cutting across this generic divide — and this for the simple reason that the gaps left in the stated positions of the protagonists are still too wide to be bridged by ringing declarations on the need to push forward the cause of multilateral trade liberalisation.

Among other things, this is indicated by the “technical” undertone of Mr Lamy's “progress report” last Friday to the Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) on the Second Senior Officials Week in Geneva.

Process flow

Among other things, Mr Lamy said that in agriculture the technical discussions were moving forward, such as the “verification process of some base data”.

On modalities, to quote the WTO chief, “the Chair (of the farm negotiating committee) expects to consult on technical work in various issues, including the Special Safeguard Mechanism and tariff simplification, and expects to receive a report on ongoing work between delegations on tropical products and preference erosion.” He will also look to engage with members on the work plan for the new year.

Mr Lamy's words have been quoted to give the reader a feel of how the negotiations are proceeding and of the inevitable tediousness of the entire process which, almost by definition, rules out an early meeting of minds on the contentious issues involved.

To extend this to the non-farm talks, Mr Lamy said that there “is a feeling (that is, after nearly four years of hard bargaining) that progress is being made on NTBs (non-tariff barriers), but that more technical work is required,” which really is not saying much considering the declared urgency of sealing an agreement on the Round.

Meet Focus

So what is the Ministerial conference going to focus on, apart from the declarations it is most certainly going to issue on the Doha Round?

In fact, Mr Lamy has formally asked for comments to be made on the future Doha process when he told the TNC that “it would be useful to get their (the Ministers') guidance as to how they see engagement in the Doha negotiations post-December, so that this could inform the December Senior Officials Week.”

Perhaps of more practical use at this point of time would be for the Ministerial meeting to throw up ideas on how the organisation could be “toned up” to perform its functions even better than it has done in the past, on which there can be no two views.

It is here that India, among other members, can play a useful role, specially in view of the fact that New Delhi has already prepared (in July) a note on the subject entitled “Strengthening the WTO”.

Five specific proposals have been submitted for discussion, the objective being “to enhance the usefulness of the WTO and to make the system more relevant, vibrant and user friendly for both the member States and the larger trading community”.

These proposals, as the document states, “do not represent a comprehensive list” of measures to improve the functioning of the WTO; other member-countries have other ideas, some similar “but to be implemented in different ways”.

Proposals

In a nutshell, the Indian proposals are: The setting up of a project to enhance the “integrated database” to include in an appropriate format non-tariff data, based on the current notification obligations under WTO Agreements; monitoring the developing trends in RTAs and developing non-binding best-practice guidelines for reference while negotiating new RTAs; establishing a steering group or a subsidiary body to comprehensively examine all WTO-related instruments allowing members to grant preferential access to LDCs; adoption of international standards in respect of sanitary, phytosanitary and technical barriers to trade, focusing on the need for members primarily to base domestic regulations on such international standards for all trade in goods.

The fifth proposal is to include in the agenda of formal WTO Committee meetings the following: Monitoring of recent developments in members on the trade disciplines covered by the committee concerned, based on a compilation by the WTO Secretariat of developments between formal meetings and verified by the member concerned; regular discussions on general developments in the areas covered by the committee, including in the presence of outside experts; and discussion on and resolution of low-threshold specific trade concerns in small group settings.

Of these five ideas, three are certainly attractive, impinging on areas of the multilateral trade scene which are becoming more important by the day. These relate to non-tariff data, international standards applied to sectors such as sanitary, phytosanitary and technical barriers to trade, and monitoring trends in regional trade agreements. The problem is that the proposals, no matter how sensible, may not have a smooth passage because of the strength of vested national interest, the same obstacle which is holding up progress in firming up the Doha Round.