Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 13 • Number 16 • 6th May 2009

New Doha Approach Floated as Delegates Consider Late-Autumn Ministerial

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Trade officials in Geneva are considering a new approach to the Doha Round that would bypass the negotiation of modalities - the broad outlines of a deal that WTO Members have been struggling to forge for more than seven years - and move directly into scheduling countries’ specific commitments on cutting tariffs and reducing subsidy levels.

Trade officials told Bridges that the Canadian ambassador to the WTO, John Gero, first suggested the idea among roughly a dozen trade delegates about two weeks ago, but only informally. Although no delegation, including Canada, has officially proposed the idea, it seems to have attracted some support.

But several developing countries have signalled some discomfort with the idea of abandoning the negotiations on modalities, on the grounds that such an approach could allow the US and other major developed countries to extract extra concessions from them. In the absence of a solid development-centred framework to guide the line-by-line negotiation of tariff cuts, some of the WTO’s poorer Members fear that the existing draft modalities texts could become the starting point, rather than the endpoint, of their ultimate liberalisation commitments. Without modalities to guide the process, they worry that they would have nothing to fall back on to counter developed countries’ pushes for greater market access.

One developing country trade official stressed that skipping the modalities phase is “completely outside the mandate” of the Doha Round. Such a jump could risk erasing the delicate balance that has been painstakingly built up in negotiations thus far, the delegate said.

“We don’t like the idea,” one developing country trade official said.

The new approach could also allow developed countries to exploit unresolved issues in the negotiations and give less ground than they otherwise would, one delegate said.

But a jump straight into scheduling could present some real advantages, one trade source said. The new approach could accelerate the process of implementing the cuts to tariffs and subsidies that would be embodied in a world trade deal. Secondly, exporting countries could quickly determine how products of concern to them would be treated.

Some developing countries say they would then need at least a year to schedule all of their commitments; the WTO secretariat, which would likely run the scheduling process for Least-Developed Countries, or LDCs, says it would need at least six months to complete the work. If that lengthy process could begin sooner rather than later, then all the better, one insider said.

At this point, though, the new approach is still in an ‘exploratory phase’, as one delegate put it. Whether the idea will eventually be turned into an official proposal remains to be seen.

Ministerial tentatively set for late autumn

In other WTO news, the organisation’s director-general, Pascal Lamy, suggested in an address to delegates at last week’s General Council meeting that a high-level WTO summit could be coming up soon.

“We have not had a Ministerial meeting since 2005 and my own sense is that we should not close 2009 without one,” Lamy said.

WTO rules call for a Ministerial conference once every two years, but three and a half years have passed since the most recent such meeting was held in Hong Kong. Other Ministerials have been held in Cancun (2003), Doha, Qatar (2001), Seattle (1999), Geneva (1998) and Singapore (1996).

One trade official said that a tentative proposal has been made to hold such a meeting at WTO headquarters in Geneva from 30 November to 2 December of this year. Delegations will have the chance to discuss the proposed dates at the next meeting of the General Council, which is set for 26 and 27 May.

But the next Ministerial could have quite a different feel from past gatherings. Unlike previous summits, the proposed Ministerial would focus on the WTO’s ‘regular work’, not its trade negotiations, Lamy told delegates last week.

“We should de-dramatise Ministerial meetings, make them a more regular exercise, where WTO activities are reviewed across the board, to ascertain the level of satisfaction of members with the running of WTO activities and to address priorities at a political level,” the director-general told the General Council.

“A regular Ministerial meeting is one thing; Ministerial involvement in negotiations is another. We should not confuse the two,” he added.

One trade delegate told Bridges that not all delegations were happy with the notion of downplaying the Doha Round at a potential Ministerial meeting, but another said that the lack of emphasis on the negotiations could simply be a ploy to lower expectations for the high-level summit.

But even if Doha is not explicitly listed in the agenda of the proposed Ministerial, the Round will not necessarily be put on the backburner for good this year, delegates said. Several trade officials noted that progress on the Doha Round could come on the sidelines of upcoming high-level meetings in other forums. Ministers from the Cairns Group, a coalition of agricultural exporters, will be meeting in Bali from 7-9 June; less than three weeks later, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) will be holding its annual ministerial meeting in Paris. And then in early July the world’s major economic powers will gather at a G8 summit in Italy. Trade ministers meeting on the sidelines of these summits could jumpstart progress in the Doha Round, sources said.

But even with the many opportunities for sideline negotiations, a gathering of ministers at WTO headquarters to achieve a breakthrough in the Round is “not likely” to come before the end of the summer, one delegate said.

USTR Kirk to visit Geneva next week

Progress on the DDA could get a boost next week, as US Trade Representative Ron Kirk is said to be planning his first visit to WTO headquarters in Geneva. Although the trip has yet to be formally announced, a trade source suggested that Kirk is likely to meet with Lamy.

Many Geneva-based trade officials complain that the US has not been clear on its objectives with regard to the Doha Round talks. This lack of clarity from a major player has effectively stalled negotiations in Geneva, they say. Some delegates expressed hope that Kirk’s pending stopover at the WTO could shed some light on Washington’s stance in the talks.

“Everyone is waiting for the US,” one trade official said.

ICTSD reporting.

One response to “New Doha Approach Floated as Delegates Consider Late-Autumn Ministerial”

ICTSD • Bridges Weekly - Kirk’s Geneva Visit Signals US Engagement on Doha 13th May 2009 at 20:18
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