Battlelines drawn
negotiations on the crucial issue of agriculture intensified in the build-up to the Fifth World Trade Organization (wto) Ministerial Conference in Cancun, Mexico, with several developing countries joining hands to take on the formidable eu-us combine. The latter presented a joint paper on August 13 at the wto general council in session at Geneva. The move was countered by six like-minded developing countries, which tabled a proposal on August 19. The next day, nine members of the Cairns Group, along with India, China, Mexico and Peru, followed suit. The developing nations' alliance may get a further boost as more countries are expected to hop aboard.
Earlier, India's Union minister for commerce and industry, Arun Jaitley, dismissed the eu-us proposal as "unacceptable' saying: "They must reduce and, thereafter, eliminate domestic subsidies.' The trade commissioner of the European Commission, Pascal Lamy, was upbeat about the eu-us paper. "(It) is just what is required to enable the wto negotiations to change gear and move us into the final phase,' declared Lamy. us agriculture secretary Ann Veneman shared Lamy's enthusiasm. "We were asked by the wto leadership to try and reach an accord with the eu so that the agricultural and other negotiations could move forward. We have responded,' she emphasised, adding that it was now up to the other members to act.
While the group of 13 developing countries' paper follows the same structure as the eu-us joint text, it demands a higher level of ambition in all the three pillars of agricultural trade