archives: WTO InfoJaitley's Smiling & Lamy Has Egg On His Face As Cancun Fails
The Financial Express (India) - 16 September 2003 — Bibek DebroyThe Cancun talks have collapsed. Since morning, there have been Green Room discussions based on yesterday's (September 13) draft. This follows late night negotiations also. Throughout morning, there is speculation about what is likely to happen. Since there is sharp polarisation over the September 13 draft, will Cancun be extended by a day to get an agreement? Some people begin to change itineraries.
Till lunch-time, there is very little information. All we know is that Green Room discussions are being held over Singapore issues. Reports or rumours keep filtering out. EU has agreed to junk investment. It has also agreed to junk competition policy. It has agreed to retain only 2/4 of the Singapore issues - presumably, trade facilitation and transparency in government procurement. Glimmerings of an agreement seen by lunch-time. EU has reduced its insistence on Singapore issues to just trade facilitation. Rumours again. We are about to move on to Green Room processes in agriculture. Suddenly, Kenya walks out. Have talks collapsed? It takes some time before there is clarification beyond rumours. Talks have indeed collapsed. What did they collapse over? Singapore issues or agriculture? Confusion again.
It is evening before it is clear that negotiations didn't even begin seriously over agriculture. Some developing countries weren't prepared to accept any of the Singapore issues, developing countries in Africa, Caribbean and the LDCs. They were part of the Green Room process and had gone out to consult their constituents during lunch. In a strict sense, talks therefore collapsed over the Singapore issues. Although almost certainly, had there not been walk-out over Singapore, there might have been one over agriculture, considering that the September 13 draft not only contained very little, it was also perverse in some respects. For instance, it did nothing for cotton exporting countries in Africa. However, EU had its back to the wall. It had withdrawn its insistence on 3 of the Singapore issues. It was prepared to yield on domestic support and export subsidies in agriculture and even offer flexibility to developing countries on market access. That is how close we were to a deal, before the LDC walk-out happened.
As soon as news of talks collapsing is confirmed, there is great jubilation and celebration, led by fair trade NGOs. There are special cheers for Brazil and India. There are plenty of Indians hanging around the restaurant. Anyone who is prepared to shoot his (or her) mouth off is collared by Western media for interviews. Officially, the blame game is avoided. G-23 (Nigeria and Indonesia have joined) is careful not to mention US or EU, the latter is only implicitly referred to. Because numbers keep getting added, G-23 is now simply referred to as G+. G-15 is also careful in not blaming anyone. Nor does USTR blame anyone directly, although there are implicit references to Brazil, China and India. Pascal Lamy has been writing a letter from Cancun, available on the EU site. He has been dismissive of all Gs, except in his words, G-148. The other Gs won't hold. But both G-23 and G-15 have held together. In that limited sense, Pascal Lamy has had to eat his words.
There has indeed been a victory for democratic decision-making processes at WTO, away from browbeating, bullying and bribing. In that sense, the September 13 draft was a big mistake. It under-played resistance in developing countries. On Singapore issues and agriculture. And assumed bullying would work, as it had in the past. A little bit more sensitivity, a little less of arrogance, removal of the Annexes that no one had agreed to, and US and EU might have a deal. But what exactly are we celebrating? Cancun doesn't fail in the sense that Seattle did, because Doha Development Agenda (DDA) is still on. But the outstanding issues get postponed.
The deadline of January 2005 seems increasingly unlikely. Not that we have anything significant to lose, we are not net exporters of agro products in any significant way. As long as agro market access provides flexibility to protect edible oils and dairy and investment is out, we are fine, because failure in Cancun doesn't mean that WTO has disappeared or that DDA is scrapped. Nor are we in a position to negotiate free trade agreements with the US, forget the EU. A scrapping of multilateral processes will be disastrous for us. Thankfully, that's not what failure in Cancun amounts to. Back to drawing boards in Geneva. Does that mean we start from a clean slate or does it mean that convergence on some issues (implying flexibility by US and EU) continues? From statements by WTO, Pascal Lamy and USTR so far, the convergence outcome is not negated. If it is, we should worry. Because longer time-frame gives developed countries more time to break G+. So far, bucking earlier precedents, developing country coalitions have lasted. Pascal Lamy has egg on his face and Arun Jaitley is smiling.
WTO: Cancun talks collapse ( 1100 hrs)
Business Standard (India) — Tuesday, September 16, 2003The world trade talks collapsed on Sunday after 100-odd developing and least developed countries blocked the European Union and United States agenda to bring in new issues including investment rules and competition policy into the World Trade Organisation (WTO) work programme after bitterly fighting over agriculture, loaded heavily in favour of developed countries in the draft declaration.
After working hard and constructively to make progress, the talks ended without any declaration as more work was needed to be done in some key areas, a ministerial statement issued at the end of the failed five-day ministerial said.
In areas where a high-level of convergence on texts was reached, "we undertake to maintain this convergence while working for an acceptable overall outcome," the one-page statement said, adding a meeting of the General Council of WTO at senior officials level will be convened before December 15 to move towards a successful and timely conclusion of the negotiations.
Analysts say this was one of the biggest defeat for trade liberalisation since a chaotic meeting at Seattle in 1999 when the ministerial failed after the United States and European Union tried to thrust labour standards and environment, considered to be non-trade issues by developing countries into the work programme of WTO.
"Nothing has been agreed at this conference and it was not clear how the future declaration could take place," analysts said, adding there was a success in failure in the sense it has helped developing countries forge a formidable alliance on the contentious Singapore and agriculture issues.
The collapse had taken many, including India, by surprise as developing countries had nearly succeeded in extracting a major concession to shelve three of the four the Singapore issues -investment, competition policy and transparency in government procurement into the backburner.
Now the Singapore issue is not dead, analysts said, adding the ministerial has, however, brought developing countries concerns into the centre-stage of the multilateral trade negotiations.
After clashing over agriculture for the entire five days of the ministerial, the WTO talks died when developing countries, particularly from Africa and Latin American and least developed countries, refused to discuss the Singapore issues saying all the four issues should not come into the work programme of WTO.
"We have always alerted people that unless they listen to the developing countries ... this is what will happen," Malaysia's Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz, who along with India spearheaded the G-16 alliance of developing countries that has now swelled to 29, said.
With the 146-member WTO coming out with a heavily loaded draft declaration in favour of EU and US on Sunday, there was a lot of haggling and what is called green room process with limited number of trade ministers starting to narrow down the difference.
When participants, who decided to take up the Singapore issue first, could not arrive at a consensus, the chairman of the ministerial, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Ernesto Derbez decided to close the meeting without a declaration.
WTO Director General Supachai Panitchpakdi told reporters that there was "no hiding the fact that the deadlock was a "setback". He said he was disappointed, but not downhearted.
"It is important to ensure the negotiations are put back on track. If the Doha Development Agenda fails, the losers will be the poor of the world," he said, adding he would work hard for a successful outcome.
Derbez concluded that members have to clear from the lack of consensus that business as normal will not succeed and that some soul searching is needed. He blamed part of the deadlock on a failure to move away from rhetoric.
The EU and US negotiators complained that India, Brazil and other key developing countries had brought more rhetoric than proposals to the negotiating table.
However, India, Brazil, China and other major developing countries turned the table on them saying lack of concern for development issues of the third world, particularly on agriculture which failed to address the livelihood concerns of millions of poor farmers, led to the collapse.
EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy said he did not want to beat around the bush. "Cancun has failed. This is not only a severe blow for the WTO, but also a lost opportunity for all of us, developed and developing countries alike.
"We would all have gains. We all loose. We will not play the blame game and we will remain open to reviving this process," he said.
Indian commerce minister Arun Jaitley said: "We all had come here with the hope of getting a good deal. But the draft declaration, which came out after three-and-a-half days of negotiations, did not properly reflect the aspirations of the large number of countries both in agriculture and Singapore issues. This was perhaps the reason for consensus eluding the conference."
If his predecessor Murasoli Maran had single-handedly fought the might of developed countries at Doha, it was Arun Jaitley who was responsible for galvanising developing countries which have formed two formidable groups to voice their concerns in agriculture and Singapore issues. (PTI)
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