Logjam called Doha Round

The eighth Ministerial of the WTO, held in Geneva late last week, has once again shown people that, when it comes to acting on development issues with a fallout on trade, the international community is struck by an inexplicable inertia in the realm of actual decision-taking, as opposed to making commitment after commitment on what should be done. In other words, the Ministerial has pumped up the “ambition” without, however, taking concrete measures to flesh out the resolve.

CONCRETE STEPS

Indeed, what precisely was done at Geneva that can be described as adding to the corpus of meaningful decisions to liberalise international trade? Perhaps, the most significant was the deal regarding Government procurement, followed by the streamlining of accession processes for the least-developed countries, which has to take effect. Then, there was the admittance to the WTO of four new members, namely, Montenegro, Samoa, Russia and Vanuatu. These were among the important “concrete” steps taken, which are being flaunted as new feathers in WTO's cap.

But beyond this, nothing was achieved which can mark out the eighth Ministerial at Geneva as forming an important milestone in the progress of trade liberalisation for the benefit of development generally. Even so, there was all-round appreciation and recognition of the fact that, especially in today's economically-regressive circumstances, a lowering of trade barriers is absolutely indispensable if, first, the global economy is to be prevented from being sucked into a severe depression and, secondly, if the prospects of all-round development, particularly among the developing economies, are to be strengthened so as to be sustainable in the decades ahead.

CURRENT IMPASSE

A result of this was the admission by the WTO membership (as part of a consensus) that there was a need “to more fully explore different negotiating approaches while respecting the principles of transparency and inclusiveness” in view of the stark, “regrettable” fact that the negotiations to conclude the Doha Development Agenda (the Doha Round) “are at an impasse”. The Ministers also acknowledged that “there are significantly different perspectives on the possible results that members can achieve in certain areas of the single undertaking”, the important upshot of which was that “it is unlikely that all elements of the Doha Development Round could be concluded simultaneously in the near future”.

Perhaps, expectedly, the Ministerial chairman's statement, referring to the Doha Development Agenda, beats around the bush, taking refuge in declarations of intention instead of laying bare the precise nature of the stumbling block in the way of implementing the Doha Round. Thus, the Ministers once again committed themselves “to work actively, in a transparent and inclusive manner, towards a successful multilateral conclusion of the Doha Development Agenda in accordance with its mandate”; also “to advance negotiations, where progress can be achieved, including focusing on the elements of the Doha Declaration that allow members to reach provisional or definitive agreements based on consensus earlier than the full conclusion of the single undertaking”. It was also reiterated once again that members “will intensify their efforts to look into ways that may allow members to overcome the most critical and fundamental stalemates in the areas where multilateral convergence has proven to be especially challenging”.

The Durban meeting on climate change has shown that the developed countries will extract their pound of flesh in concessions from the developing economies before agreeing to move forward towards a better future. It is clear that the Doha Round will succeed only if the Durban route is followed. It remains to be seen if the developing economies, especially the stronger among them, will succumb and play ball.

COMMENT NOW