Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 13 • Number 13 • 8th April 2009
Ambassadors from New Zealand, Uruguay in the Running for Chair of WTO Farm Talks
Discuss this articleShare your views with other visitors, and read what they have to say
The WTO’s negotiating committee on agriculture is in need of a new chair, and it appears as though New Zealand ambassador David Walker may be the leading candidate, although the decision has yet to be finalised. Ambassador Guillermo Valles Galmés of Uruguay is also in the running for the role.
Walker “is certainly considered as the front-runner,” Peter Balas, the European Commission’s deputy director-general for trade, told a news conference earlier this week, Reuters reported. But a G20 diplomat said on Wednesday that the he had not “heard of any consensus” on Walker being offered the position.
The head of the WTO’s General Council, Ambassador Bruce Gosper of Australia, has been holding consultations with the Membership as part of the selection process, trade sources said. A second round of the meetings wrapped up earlier this month and a third and final round of consultations is expected next week, after which the General Council will choose the new chair from a list of candidates. At time of writing, several sources indicated that Walker and Valles Galmés were the only officials being considered for the role.
The chair of the farm talks is a crucial role: the agriculture negotiations form one of three pillars in the Doha Round of trade talks, and many blame an agricultural issue — the special safeguard mechanism — for triggering the most recent major setback in the talks, the collapse of high-level negotiations at WTO headquarters in Geneva last July.
But the chair of the negotiating committee, who ultimately serves as a mediator among delegations, can only do so much to promote agreement. “This is a members-driven organisation,” one delegate stressed. “If the members want to reach an agreement [the chair] is not something that will affect it.”
Given that the agriculture negotiations are now in a relatively slow stage, some delegates have said they want to be sure not to impose a timeline on the selection process. “We have to take the time that we need,” one official said.
The role opened up last month after former New Zealand Ambassador Crawford Falconer announced that he was returning to his home country to take a job in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (see Bridges Weekly, 18 March 2009, http://ictsd.net/i/news/bridgesweekly/43437/).
ICTSD reporting. “New Zealander seen chairing WTO farm talks,” REUTERS, 6 April 2009.
Add a comment
Enter your details and a comment below, then click Submit Comment. We’ll review and publish the best comments.