The Doha Round of trade negotiations is in trouble again.
Alan Beattie reports in yesterday's Financial Times: "Waning expectations: agreement on trade remains remote as time trickles away Enthusiasm curbed by lack of external support" (July 18 - subscription required).
Member nations had hoped to have the outline of an agreement by the end of July. They need it by then. The WTO will shut down in August for vacation. When things get going again in September, there will only be 12 weeks until the meeting of member nation trade ministers in Hong Kong. The trade ministers won't have time for extensive negotiations in Hong Kong; most key elements need to be in place when they get there. This is the last meeting of the trade ministers before President Bush's trade promotion authority runs out in 2007.
But nothing is done. "Almost all parts of the negotiations - agriculture, industrial goods and services - are well behind schedule and some have reached impasse. Only talks on the relatively minor area of "trade facilitation" - easing the way for trade through streamlining customs and border procedures and helping developing countries build up the infrastructure to trade - seems to be making progress."
Beattie doesn't get into the details, but these negotiations offer a lot for everyone, and quite a bit for the world's poor. He does note that "The basic trade-off that would be at the heart of a successful conclusion to Doha is already clear: the rich nations - the EU, US, Japan and Canada - would reduce protection on agriculture in return for more access to the goods and services markets of the developing world, mainly big emerging market countries such as Brazil, India and China." So why is progress so hard? Beattie suggests several things:
- Too many nations (148 WTO members) involved in the negotiations.
- A disproportionate focus on agricultural producer and export subsidies, when the big money (93% of the potential agricultural benefits) is to be made from tariff reductions.
- A reluctance by the EU member governments to make agricultural tariff concessions.
- The developing world doesn't speak with one voice. Brazil, India, and Mauritius have different interests and objectives.
- A lack of interest by business - because of the round's focus on agricultural issues, because business in developed countries is relatively uninterested in developing country opportunities, and because business is distracted by bilateral and regional trade agreements.
- Developing country reluctance (encouraged by many of the development NGOs) to reduce barriers to trade in manufactured goods, and in services.
Next week we get one more chance. "A group of ministers and officials will gather in Geneva next week for one last big push before the summer break. Since expectations have already carefully been lowered, any advance would count as a success..."
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