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Members Discuss Lamy's Draft Ministerial Text; Revisions To Follow
WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy released a comprehensive draft Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration text to Members at a short meeting of the Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) on 26 November. Negotiators have since been discussing potential modifications to the text almost non-stop, in a series of ‘green room’ meetings involving Lamy and representatives from 25-30 delegations, as…
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EU Adopts Sugar Reform
EU member states agreed on 24 November to reform their sugar regime for the first time since 1968, voting to slash the price that the EU guarantees domestic sugar producers by 36 percent over four years, bringing it closer to world market levels. African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) countries that have long been able to…
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Lamy's Draft Largely Adopts CTE Chair's Text
WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy’s 26 November comprehensive draft Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration incorporated almost word-for-word the entire text submitted to him by environment negotiations Chair Ambassador Toufiq Ali of Bangladesh. The text contains two alternative bracketed approaches for identifying environmental goods and services (EGS) for the purposes of expedited liberalisation…
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Chile And Brazil Propose Public Interest Exemptions To WIPO Broadcast Treaty
Brazil and Chile’s calls for a series of public interest exceptions to be entrenched in a future treaty on the rights of broadcasting organisations took centre stage during negotiations at the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) from 21-23 November. Many countries have expressed concerns that the future treaty, which seeks to update the rights of…
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AG, IP Hobble Andean-US Free Trade Talks
Nine days of free trade negotiations between the US and Colombia, Peru and Ecuador have again ended without an agreement. This round — the thirteenth — had been expected to be the last in the Andean-US free trade agreement (FTA) talks, which started in 2004. Nevertheless, disagreements over farm trade and intellectual property rights (IPRs)…
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Rich Countries Seeking ‘Round For Free’; Say Nine Developing Countries
Nine developing countries have launched an initiative to "reclaim the developmental objectives of the Doha Round." Ambassadors from several of them told a 28 November press conference that some rich countries had been systematically frustrating both the offensive and defensive interests of developing countries in the multilateral trading system, thus threatening their prospects for development.…
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LDCs Granted Limited Extension For Implementing TRIPS Commitments
WTO Members agreed on 29 November to give least-developed countries (LDCs) a seven-and-a-half year extension to apply rules protecting patents, copyrights, and other intellectual property under the Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS). Critics have cautioned that the extension is limited since it prohibits LDCs from loosening existing intellectual property laws…
- In Brief
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In Brief
EU AGREES TO NEW BANANA TARIFF OF EUR 176 PER TONNE EU member states overcame internal disagreement on 25 November to agree on a reform package for their banana import regime that would set their most-favoured nation (MFN) tariff level at EUR 176 per tonne from 1 January 2006. It is, however, far from clear whether…
- WTO in Brief
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US Shrimp Anti-Dumping Duties Under Attack On Several Fronts
On 15 November, Ecuador initiated WTO dispute proceedings against US anti-dumping duties on its shrimp exports. It alleges that the method known as "zeroing" used by the US Department of Commerce to calculate the duties contravenes WTO rules. Under the WTO Anti-dumping Agreement, a WTO Member can impose anti-dumping duties on an imported product if…
- Events
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Events
EVENTS For a more comprehensive list of events in trade and sustainable development, please refer to ICTSD’s web calendar. If you would like to submit an event, please email us. Upcoming : 1 December - 7 December 1-2 December, Beirut, Lebanon: REGIONAL SEMINAR ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND COMPETITIVENESS OF THE…
- Resources
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Resources
THE EU CORPORATE TRADE AGENDA: THE ROLE AND THE INTERESTS OF CORPORATIONS AND THEIR LOBBY GROUPS IN TRADE POLICY-MAKING IN THE EUROPEAN UNION. By Christina Deckwirth. The Seattle to Brussels Network, November 2005. This non-governmental organisation report claims that EU trade policy is "being driven by the demands of European businesses for new markets rather…