Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 8 • Number 20 • 9th June 2004
Agriculture Negotiations: Members Still Divided Over Market Access
The WTO special session of the Committee on Agriculture (CoA) convened from 2-4 June for another ‘agriculture week’. Members are continuing negotiations and consultations in an effort to establish a negotiating framework agreement for the Doha agriculture talks before delegates adjourn at the end of July for the annual WTO break. The discussions mainly focused on new proposals tabled by the G-20, G-33 and G-10 negotiating groups. In his summary at the concluding plenary session, CoA special session Chair Tim Groser said that market access remained "by far the most difficult" negotiating pillar. In contrast, he said he would now be in a position to draft a section reflecting "emerging consensus" on domestic support, getting it "80 percent" right. Members are now casting their eyes on the UN Conference for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) XI ministerial conference, where trade ministers are expected to meet informally to bridge remaining gaps in Members’ positions. The G-90 of least-developed and other weak and vulnerable countries has not yet presented a revised position, but indicated it could adopt a joint agriculture proposal at a forthcoming G-90 ministerial meeting in Mauritius.
Groser points to lack of urgency
On the general spirit in the week’s talks, Groser reported a "business-like atmosphere" and Members’ "demonstration of commitment" to reach a framework agreement by the end of July. Nevertheless, Groser found that momentum was not yet sufficient, and said he felt there was "too much comfort" among negotiators who seemed to believe that the framework would create itself.
Unlike in the other ‘agriculture weeks’ this year, Groser played a more decisive leadership role in the 2-4 June consultations. He organised — reportedly on request of the African Group among others — his own small group meetings in order to find out privately where individual Members could be flexible. Groser had previously stressed the need for Members to sort out their differences among themselves and attended their discussions only as an observer.
G-20, G-33 and G-10 table new proposals
Discussions in this third post-Cancun ‘agriculture week’ largely centred on new proposals submitted by the G-20 group of developing countries, including Brazil and South Africa, the G-10 — comprising mainly developed country net food-importers — and the G-33 group of developing countries advocating the concepts of special products (SPs) and a special safeguard mechanism (SSM) for developing countries.
The recent G-20 market access proposal, which presented general principles of a future tariff reduction formula rather than proposing an alternative tariff cut methodology (see BRIDGES Weekly, 2 June 2004), was generally welcomed by key Members. EC Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy commented at a 31 May conference in the Netherlands that the proposal was "constructive and a pretty good basis to start [the] week’s talks on agriculture in Geneva". On the other hand, Lamy’s spokesperson Arancha Gonzalez criticised the group’s proposal for its lack of detail, especially on the question of how developed countries were to achieve tariff cuts.
For its part, the G-10 — Bulgaria, Chinese Taipei, Korea, Iceland, Israel, Japan, Liechtenstein, Mauritius, Norway and Switzerland — tabled a new informal submission addressing all three pillars in the agriculture negotiations: market access, domestic support and export competition, with a strong focus on the fist pillar. In its preliminary reaction to the G-20 proposal, the G-10 expressed its concern regarding "many of its elements". These included the proposed capping of tariffs, and the requirement for developed countries to provide effective new market access for sensitive products through a combination of tariff cuts and new tariff rate quota (TRQs) commitments — and this without any flexibility to take into account non-trade concerns. However, the group highlighted its preparedness "to discuss various types of tariff reduction formulas". G-10 member such as Japan had previously stated that they would not be ready to accept any methodology for tariff cuts other than the ‘blended’ formula promoted by the EC and US, which could shield some sensitive products from radical cuts.
Indonesia, the leader of the G-33 group consisting mostly of net-food importing developing countries, presented a new non-paper on behalf of the group (JOB(04)/65, not yet derestricted) on market access. Indonesia listed a number of general criteria for a future reduction formula similar to those presented by the G-20. However, the G-33 reiterated that it was not willing to accept new TRQ commitments for developing countries. The group also pointed out that developing countries should be able to self-designate ’special products’ (SPs) which should be exempted from any reduction commitment. The special safeguard mechanism (SSM) to be established for developing countries should automatically apply to SPs. The recent G-20 proposal left most of these issue open.
Hopes now on ministerial-level meeting in Sao Paulo
Between last week and the forthcoming CoA special session on 23-25 June, trade ministers will convene at UNCTAD XI, to be held from 13-18 June in Sao Paolo, Brazil. According to trade sources, many Members as well as Chair Groser appear to expect that Members’ senior trade envoys will be taking the opportunity at the ministerial-level gathering to further narrow the differences in their positions. Reportedly, the so-called group of Five Interested Parties (FIPs) including the US, EC, Brazil (G-20 leader, Cairns group member), India (G-33 and G-20 member) and Australia (Cairns group leader) has scheduled an informal meeting for 13 June where they hope to achieve consensus internally on the general elements of the framework text. The planned UNCTAD XI ‘mini-ministerial’ is seen as the last minister-level meeting prior to the 27-29 July WTO General Council meeting, where Members hope to finalise the framework for the agriculture talks.
G-90 working on new common position on agriculture
The 18 participants of a G-90 ‘mini-ministerial’ held from 3-4 June in Georgetown, Guyana (see related story, this issue), adopted a set of political and operational texts with the aim of feeding them into consultative processes leading up to a G-90 ministerial-level meeting in Mauritius in mid-July. The Mauritius meeting will seek to adopt a common G-90 position on agriculture for the upcoming WTO General Council meeting in late July. Reportedly, the Georgetown Consensus document — which largely draws on elements set out in the Kigali Consensus paper adopted by African Union members in late May (see BRIDGES Weekly, 2 June 2004) — responds more or less positively to the initiative launched by the EC to give the G-90 group the "Round for Free" (see BRIDGES Weekly, 13 May 2004). Participants at the meeting supported the idea that G-90 members be exempted from any tariff reduction commitment, as well as the EC proposal that advanced developing countries should provide particularly weak and vulnerable countries with duty- and quota-free market access.
Brazil’s trade minister Celso Amorim, who coordinates the G-20, also participated in the meeting, and he called on the G-90 to build a common front with other developing countries, warning that although the EC proposal may be "tempting at first sight, [it] might create permanent discrimination between full participants and other members relegated to a secondary role". He also cautioned that, while the EC was promoting the exemption of G-90 members from new multilateral commitments, it would "require equivalent or even higher levels of concessions" in its bilateral Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) negotiations with African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries.
The G-90 is an alliance comprising of most members of the African Union, ACP and LDC grouping. The Mauritius ministerial, aimed at consolidating the negotiating positions of the various constituents in the group, is scheduled for 12-16 July.
ICTSD reporting; "G-90 mini-ministerial adopts comprehensive proposals on Doha programme," TWN INFO SERVICE, 9 June 2004; "US applauds efforts on farm trade talks," AP, 4 June 2004.