WTO disappointed by Cancún setback, pledges to put trade talks back on track

The head of the World Trade Organization (WTO) has pledged to put negotiations for freer trade back on track after a deadlock crippled a major ministerial conference that ended yesterday, saying he was disappointed but not downhearted.

There was no hiding the fact that the deadlock was a setback and it was important to ensure the negotiations are put back on track, WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi said after the talks collapsed yesterday in Cancún, Mexico.

If the Doha Development Agenda – adopted in 2001 in the Qatari capital of Doha in an effort to achieve freer trade worldwide – fails, the losers will be the poor of the world, Mr. Supachai added, pledging to work hard for a successful outcome.

At the end of the five-day meeting the trade ministers of the 146-nation WTO issued a statement instructing Mr. Supachai to convene a meeting of the General Council at the senior officials level by 15 December “to take the action necessary at that stage to enable us to move towards a successful and timely conclusion of the negotiations.”

The General Council is the WTO’s highest-level decision-making body in Geneva, meeting regularly to carry out the functions of the WTO. It has representatives, usually ambassadors or equivalent, from all member governments and has the authority to act on behalf of the ministerial conference, which only meets about every two years.

The talks ran aground over issues ranging from the speedy elimination of agricultural subsidies by rich countries that undercut farmers in the world’s poorest nations to the so-called Singapore issues – trade and investment, competition policy, transparency in government procurement – which developing nations felt might interfere with their domestic policies.

“All participants have worked hard and constructively to make progress as required under the Doha mandates,” the ministerial statement said. “We have, indeed, made considerable progress. However, more work needs to be done in some key areas to enable us to proceed towards the conclusion of the negotiations in fulfilment of the commitments we took at Doha.”

Referring to the December meeting, it added: “We will bring with us into this new phase all the valuable work that has been done at this Conference. In those areas where we have reached a high level of convergence on texts, we undertake to maintain this convergence while working for an acceptable overall outcome. Notwithstanding this setback, we reaffirm all our Doha Declarations and Decisions and recommit ourselves to working to implement them fully and faithfully.”