U.S. – Australia Relations
Top Trade Ministers Return to Geneva as Talks Near Deadline
Washington, D.C. — 17 July 2006
Russian WTO accession agreement expected in two-three months, USTR Schwab says
By Bruce Odessey Washington File Staff Writer
Washington -- Trade ministers from six key markets were headed for Geneva late July 17 to assess the chances of rescuing long-stalled World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations from collapse.
U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab and ministers from the other so-called G-6 markets -- Australia, Brazil, the European Union (EU), India and Japan -- were scheduled to meet with WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy at the organization's headquarters in Geneva, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR).
Earlier in the day at a separate session during the 2006 Group of Eight (G8) Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, Lamy addressed the G8 leaders plus those from Brazil, China, India, Mexico, South Africa and the EU. The G8 comprises Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, the United States and Russia.
Lamy's address followed by one day the G8 leaders' release of a statement urging intense negotiations to reach agreement by mid-August on the modalities -- or broad formulas and timetables -- for reducing agricultural and industrial tariffs and agricultural subsidies. Such action would extend by two weeks the current July 31 deadline.
Whether the nearly five years of negotiations, formally called the Doha Development Agenda, will end soon in success or failure "lies with you who are seated around this table today," Lamy told the leaders.
The deadlock over agricultural and industrial trade "will lead us to failure very soon if you do not give your ministers further room for negotiation," he said.
He urged the leaders to weigh the political costs of making further concessions against the cost of failing to achieve economic gains potentially greater than those from any previous trade round.
"A failure would send out a strong negative signal for the future of the world economy and the danger of a resurgence of protectionism," Lamy said, "at a time when the pace of globalization is weighing heavily on the social and economic fabric of many countries and when geopolitical instability is on the rise."
In Washington, trade expert Jeffrey Schott of the Institute for International Economics told the Washington File that although leaders in St. Petersburg achieved no breakthrough in the WTO deadlock, they might have indicated some additional flexibility on agriculture and industrial tariffs, otherwise called nonagricultural market access or NAMA.
"What the leaders basically did was cut two weeks off of the Geneva diplomats' vacation," Schott said. "I think that there's a good chance that we'll see a ratcheting up of the offers” from the G-6 on agriculture and NAMA in the next two weeks.
U.S. negotiators have asserted that the United States is prepared to offer even bigger cuts in agricultural subsidies than those proposed in October 2005 but only if sharp tariff cuts are forthcoming on agricultural goods from the EU and other wealthy countries and on industrial goods from rapidly growing developing countries.
Time is running out for completing of the Doha negotiations by the end of 2006, six months before the U.S. president's grant of negotiating authority from Congress expires.
RUSSIAN WTO ACCESSION
President Bush cited Congress' power in U.S. trade policy during his July 15 press availability with Russian President Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg. Despite intense negotiations, the two countries could not agree yet on a bilateral agreement for Russia's accession to the WTO.
"We're tough negotiators," Bush said, "because we want the agreement that we reach to be accepted by our United States Congress."
Later that day, Schwab predicted the two sides would be able to reach agreement within two months to three months. She said the tough issues remaining include Russian inspection standards for beef and pork imports. The countries had narrowed their differences over industrial tariffs and services trade as well as intellectual property protection, she said.
Schott said that because some members of Congress likely will raise nontrade issues such as democracy and human rights whenever they consider Russia's WTO accession, U.S. negotiators have to make sure they have a strong accession agreement.
"Some of the remaining issues are very sensitive," Schott said.
A transcript of the briefing by Schwab and a transcript of the Bush-Putin press availability are available on the White House Web site. Lamy's remarks and the G8 statement on trade are available on the WTO Web site.
(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)Original document from usinfo.state.gov.
Last update Monday, 19 November 2007
