1.1 Seventh Ministerial Conference:
- General
The WTO's Seventh Ministerial Conference took place from 30 November to 2 December in Geneva, bringing together nearly 3,000 delegates representing all 153 WTO Members and 56 Observers.
Although this conference was not designed for negotiations, almost all ministers stated that they wanted the Doha Round talks to achieve an agreement soon, a large number of them calling for this to be done by the end of 2010. WTO ministers ended their two-and-a-half-day Geneva conference on 2 December 2009 having declared that they want to try to conclude the Doha Round talks quickly and agreeing to extend “moratoriums” on electronic commerce and intellectual property. “Moratoriums” are agreements not to take certain actions.
Director-General Pascal Lamy stated that the meeting provided the kind of reality check — on the substantive as well as political level. On the substantive level, Lamy believes that the conference sent a strong signal of convergence on the importance of trade and the Doha Round to economic recovery and poverty alleviation in developing countries. He stressed upon the centrality of the development dimension. Mr. Lamy further stated that ministers reaffirmed the need to conclude the Round in 2010 and for a stock-taking exercise to take place in the first quarter of next year. Similarly, he referred to the wide support for asking senior officials to continue to work to map the road towards that point.
With respect to the envisaged deadline, 2010, Mr. Lamy has states that concluding the Doha round of global trade talks by 2010 is an "open question," painting a cautious view about the prospects for sealing a new trade treaty by the deadline. He recognized the progress made so far but said that a breakthrough would be needed by the end of March next year for the deal to be completed in 2010, as heads of state have pledged to do at several G20 summits this year. “End of March next year [i.e. 2010] is probably the moment when we will know whether or not 2010 remains doable”, he said. While the deadline is not necessarily concrete, Mr. Lamy said that all efforts to edge the accord to signature are welcome: “Anything that takes us nearer to the finishing line is a good thing.”
Mr. Lamy further urged the WTO's 153 member states to show political will at home to close gaps in the negotiations and produce a breakthrough by March next year to meet the 2010 deadline: "WTO members recognized the technical progress made in 2009, but they are also conscious that closing the few gaps remaining on big ticket [issues] will only happen when they enter the end game," Mr. Lamy said. "And this will not occur unless they are all ready for heavy political lifting at home."
- Summary of the Chairman of the Conference
In its summary, which was delivered at the closing session, the Chairman of the Conference stressed upon the wide and active participation, which in his view demonstrated the importance WTO stakeholders attach to the system in these challenging times, and on the fact that the financial and economic crisis has been the backdrop to the meeting.
He further stated that there was strong convergence on the importance of trade and the Doha Round to economic recovery and poverty alleviation in developing countries. He reiterated that the development dimension should remain central to the Round and that particular attention should be paid to issues of importance to developing countries. Ministers reaffirmed the need to conclude the Round in 2010 and for a stock-taking exercise to take place in the first quarter of next year.
The Chairman noted that gaps remain on substance and there was wide acknowledgment of the need for leadership and engagement on the remaining specific issues over the coming weeks.
Furthermore, the Chairman stated that there was wide support for building on progress made to date. There was also support for not attempting to reopen stabilized texts. It was pointed out that while priority is being given to Agriculture and NAMA, it is important to advance on other areas on the agenda, including Services, Rules and Trade Facilitation.
Finally, he also stressed that it was acknowledged that the importance of the WTO extends beyond the Round and that finishing the Round - a stimulus package with limited fiscal cost - is vital in order to ensure that the WTO remains relevant.
- Positions taken by certain (groups of) countries during the Seventh Ministerial Conference
· India: India (together with some other delegations) declared that the topics discussed during the Conference were only of a technical nature and therefore had not moved the substance of the negotiations forward. Indian Trade Minister Anand Sharma said that New Delhi wants an “expeditious” conclusion to the Doha trade negotiations, suggesting that developing countries have much at stake and the most to gain from a successful round, particularly in light of the continuing global economic crisis. Furthermore, the Minister stated that he had had “very constructive, very useful engagement with the US Trade Representative Kirk and his delegation.”
· Australia and Pakistan: On the need for action over the coming months, some delegates such as Australia and Pakistan went further than their colleagues in arguing that ministers’ involvement in early 2010 should be more than simply to take stock of the situation. These members said ministers should get down to bridging the gaps on outstanding political questions.
· G-20: In their Ministerial Communiqué of 29 November 2009, the G-20 countries have reiterated the centrality of Agriculture in the Doha Round, stating that agriculture will determine the level of ambition of the Doha Development Agenda. They further called for urgent action on the Doha Round and believe that all developed and developing members should be ready to negotiate for a conclusion of the Round respecting the Mandate. According to the G-20, there is urgent need to translate political statements into concrete engagement in Geneva in order to accomplish the shared objective of concluding the Round in 2010. Furthermore, the G-20 welcomed the exercise of assessment among developing countries and highlighted the solidarity demonstrated by developing country groups throughout the negotiations. The G-20 countries also agreed that there should be a multilateral opportunity, early next year, to evaluate progress made, identify remaining obstacles, and explore ways to successfully conclude the DDA before the end of 2010 in accordance with its Development Mandate.
· Chile, Mexico, Brazil and Uruguay: The 4 countries blamed the US for being the biggest hindrance to concluding the talks. Brazilian foreign minister Celso Amorim told reporters that “one richest country is causing the delay because it wants a few hundred million dollars from members in Nama and other areas”, referring to new US demands to erase tariffs on a range of environmental goods – which has yet to be addressed by negotiators. Furthermore, Mr. Amorim was disappointed after his bilateral session with his US counterpart on Sunday night, according to an unverified source. The US delegation reportedly came to the meeting with a list of 3,000 agricultural and industrial products on which they would like to gain greater market access. But such a long list of demands means ‘everything and nothing’, the Brazilians said, and offers no real clarification of what Washington really wants to gain from a global trade deal. Amorim reportedly complained that Kirk is just engaging in ’shadow theatre’ — pretending to play along, but ultimately delivering nothing of substance.
· EU: EU Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel had called for members to conclude framework ‘modalities’ deals within the first quarter of next year.
· United States: US Trade Representative Ron Kirk continued to hammer away at the need for emerging economies to deliver more market access in the talks: “we have made our specific interests well-known: that meaningful market opening is required to complete the Round. And we are looking for concrete signs from other Members that they are ready to join us in that commitment.” He also expressed scepticism about the process countries are contemplating for moving the talks along. In relation to the draft texts prepared by the chairs of the agriculture and industrial goods negotiations in December 2008, the U.S. Trade Representative told a journalist “the texts are called drafts for a reason — they haven’t been accepted yet.” He further questioned why a negotiating process that had ended in failure three years in a row would succeed this time: “The worst thing we can do is convene a meeting for the sake of convening one” as in July 2008, and in the years before, he said. Mr. Kirk argued that the way forward was “tough, sustained bilateral negotiations” to augment what had been accomplished thus far, with a key goal to clarify exactly what the US stood to gain in terms of access to large developing country markets. Furthermore, the US has openly opposed the idea of having more meetings to take stock until there is further movement on the modalities.
· South Africa: South African Trade Minister Rob Davies said that subsidies to cotton growers in the United States, which have suppressed global prices and hurt African producers, should be cut before the eventual Doha deal. Furthermore, while addressing the formal plenary session and at informal working sessions at the ministerial meeting, Davies strongly expressed the need for tariff flexibility and policy space to build South Africa’s productive capacity. Mr. Davies further stated that the WTO should rather give priority to “the advancement of outstanding reforms that are of urgent need to developing countries, like cotton and the LDC (least developed countries) package”. In his address to the conference, Mr. Davies gave notice of South Africa’s tougher stance on developmental issues, stating that recent attempts to “re-energise” the Doha round had done nothing to bring the WTO close to a successful developmental conclusion. Mr. Davies went on in his speech to say that “recent WTO agreements were imbalanced and reflect too much accommodation of the sensitivities of developed countries in agriculture, while demanding too much from developing countries in terms of reducing their applied industrial tariffs and policy space for industrial developments”. Mr. Davies already indicated that South Africa and other developing nations are keen to conclude the Doha talks but “the problem is the growing distance between the developmental mandate and the demands and flexibilities demanded by developed countries”. He believes that the failure of the WTO is due to its inability to enforce the developmental mandate in the round as promised in 2001.
· C4: Minister Mamadou Sanou from Burkina Faso on behalf of the Cotton four countries said with regards to cotton, “the C4 is still awaiting written counterproposals from the United States and the European Union in response to the proposed modalities which are currently set out in the text of the Chair of the Negotiating Committee on Agriculture.”
1.2 Roadmap - after the Seventh Ministerial Conference:
Director-General Pascal Lamy, in his report to the General Council on 17 December 2009 as chair of the Trade Negotiations Committee, said that Members should reserve the last week of March next year for stock-taking to assess whether concluding the Doha Round in 2010 “is doable”. Expressing the hope that “2010 is the year in which we build on the foundations for a safer global economy,” he said that “we can and must make our contribution through clinching a Doha deal”.
Mr. Lamy believes that in order to arrive at the stock-taking at the end of March a combination of elements are needed:
(i) some of the WTO Members need to intensify the bilaterals, trilaterals or quadrilaterals talks beginning as early as possible in 2010 so that the fruits of these are shared with the rest of the membership as soon as possible and feed the multilateral process;
(ii) all of the Negotiating Chairs have scheduled activities starting from the end of January and running through to March. Mr. Lamy thinks it has been important to establish this work schedule early to provide a high degree of transparency as to the process that is guiding the work of these groups;
(iii) Mr. Lamy believes that the practice of having Senior Officials in town should be continued starting in the week of 15 February 2010 and again in the week of 22 March 2010. As has been the case in the last quarter of 2009, the Senior Officials Weeks are built around meetings of the Negotiating Groups to facilitate their substantive engagement;
(iv) Mr. Lamy believes that, at this juncture, WTO Members should keep open the format and exact content of the stock-taking while keeping in mind that, at this stage, the aim of such an exercise is to assess whether 2010 remains doable.
Mr. Lamy expressed his hope that the abovementioned combination of elements in terms of the further process is helpful, but also stressed that this process is not an end in itself. He stated that the process is designed to help Members to negotiate and engage on substance, on closing remaining gaps, which is the sine qua non condition for concluding the Round in 2010.
Mr. Lamy did not indicate if this stock-tacking should be done by the Ministers or at the level of the Senior Officials. It is noteworthy that during the Seventh Ministerial Conference, there was wide support for asking senior officials to continue to work to map the road towards that point.
It is interesting to call to mind that, while the ministers at the Conference had already called for a stock-taking exercise in the first quarter of 2010, the US has opposed to such an exercise, particularly at the Ministerial level. US Trade Representative Ron Kirk had said that the substance of work in the bilateral and multilateral forum will determine success, not arbitrary setting of dates and time-lines.
1.3 Senior officials’ meeting:
Since the MC7, senior officials have been exploring possible new approaches as a way to build momentum on services and the Doha round more generally.
Some of the latest developments include the following:
· On Services, the Chair held a further Enchilada among senior officials at which there was positive engagement on a number of service topics. On domestic regulation, text-based negotiations continue, with the completion of a detailed discussion of the chapters of the Chair text, including consideration of a new proposal by several Members. In the second half of January, an open-ended informal meeting of the Special Session will be convened in order to discuss an expected draft proposal for a text of a waiver for the implementation of LDC modalities.
· Regarding Rules, the Group met with the participation of senior officials and heads of delegation on 25 November 2009. The discussion was constructive and there was general support for the Chair's work programme. In the meanwhile, the Chair held a meeting cluster on anti-dumping, horizontal subsidies and fisheries subsidies. The Group advanced its review of the draft Chair texts, and finished its consideration of the fisheries subsidies roadmap. The Group will hold further meetings in January and February 2010, at which it will complete its first review of the draft texts, take up new proposals on subsidies and fisheries subsidies, and continue the anti-dumping/countervailing duties transposition exercise. In short, no breakthroughs achieved or expected, but solid technical discussions continue.
· With respect to Regional Trade Agreements, negotiations on systemic issues of RTAs have not progressed this year. The Chair discussed a way to reinvigorate these negotiations with senior officials last month, possibly through a parallel work programme in the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements, based on work done under the Transparency Mechanism for RTAs.
· On Special and Differential Treatment, the Special Session has been focusing on the Monitoring Mechanism. As a result of the progress made, the Chairman has revised his non-paper which will now form the basis on which work on the Monitoring Mechanism will continue. In addition, Members will revert to addressing the Agreement-specific proposals once revised language or new ideas are put forward by members.
· The agriculture negotiations experienced a progress regarding to the modalities. There was also a massive technical work done undertaken by Members on the subject of the special safeguard mechanism (SSM) as well as tariff simplification. Moreover, work on the modalities will be completed during the second half of January.
1.4 South-South deal:
Outside the Doha Round context, 22 developing countries agreed to reduce tariffs. The South-South deal, facilitated by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), affects only trade between the 22 countries and includes trade heavyweights Brazil, India, Argentina and South Korea but not China. Other signatories include Egypt, Indonesia, Morocco, Mexico, North Korea and some countries still trying to accede to the WTO, like Algeria and Iran.
It would reduce by one-fifth the actual tariffs countries apply to 70 percent of each other's industrial goods rather than the maximum ceilings negotiated at the WTO. The precise details would be worked out by the end of September 2010.
Jorge Taiana, Argentina’s minister of foreign affairs and international trade, pointed to the contrast with the Doha Round negotiations, in which WTO members have been unable to agree on tariff and subsidy cuts: “Maybe it shows that the problem in trade liberalisation and trade negotiation is not in developing countries,” he told a press conference where the deal was announced. “It shows that developing countries have the will and the capability to reach an agreement.”
1.5 Positions taken by some of the key players:
We refer to the overview of positions taken by some (groups of) countries during the Seventh Ministerial Conference addressed under section 1.2 above. In addition, Interesting recent positions taken or statements made by key players (outside the Seventh Ministerial Conference) include the following:
· US: US Trade Representative Ron Kirk warned on 8 December 2009 that the US will not be “shamed” into accepting a Doha Round deal that fails to generate new market opportunities for agriculture, industrial goods and services.
· EU: The European Union's Trade Commissioner-designate Karel de Gucht said that he is not sure whether the Doha round of global trade talks would be concluded this year or in 2011. "I am personally confident that we are going to conclude the Doha round," De Gucht told European parliament lawmakers during a question-and-answer confirmation hearing in Brussels. "I don't know if it will be in 2010 or 2011, but I am quite confident." Furthermore, it is noteworthy that the European Parliament adopted a resolution on 16 December 2009 on the prospects for the Doha Development Agenda following the Seventh WTO Ministerial Conference. In this resolution, the European Parliament stated that success at the Doha trade talks could stimulate economic recovery worldwide, but the European Commission must stick to its negotiating brief on market access for farm and non-farm products and services.
