Brussels, 22/04/2013 (Agence Europe) - The WTO boss, Pascal Lamy, has called on the member countries to quicken their pace to move towards partial agreement on this chapter at the Bali conference.
Despite a political consensus between the member countries on the need for an agreement at the ministerial conference of Bali in December, on the three items on the agenda, trade facilitation, the needs of the least-developed countries and special and differentiated treatment for the developing countries, and a number of elements of the agriculture chapter (see EUROPE 10794), the current pace of the work on this final chapter is still not enough, Lamy told the WTO trade negotiations committee on 11 April. “We have to increase the pace but, even more so, we need to change our mindset. We must move from understanding the issues to reducing differences of opinion”, he stressed.
Intensive consultations are continuing, with no palpable convergence of views at this stage, on a number of proposals tabled for a partial agreement on the agriculture plank of the Doha round, including one by the developing countries of the G33 on public stocks for food security and internal food aid, and also one by the emerging countries of the G20 on the management of tariffs import quotas. The same G20 is also expected to submit a proposal on export competition in the near future. (EH/transl.fl)