On Monday 4 December, the agricultural talks process at the WTO in Geneva turned out to be a failure, just before the 11th WTO ministerial conference in Buenos Aires on 10-13 December, where limited results are expected on possible decisions on public stockholding for food security purposes and on restrictions to exports, and where results are only expected on a post-Buenos Aires work programme on the reform of domestic support. Australia considers the lack of breakthrough on this issue as "catastrophic".
In his progress report before setting off for Buenos Aires this week, the chairperson of the committee for agricultural talks at the WTO, Kenya's ambassador Stephan Karau, said on Monday 4 December that he saw "grounds" for agreement to be reached at on public stockholding, and on export prohibitions and restrictions. He also said a decision could be "envisaged" on the issue of cotton.
As regards public stockholding, Karau thought a permanent solution based on the interim decision of the 2013 WTO ministerial conference in Bali (where the G33 countries, led by India, obtained a 'peace clause' that authorises developing countries to stock agricultural products, exceeding the limits set by the WTO for domestic support) was "most likely to attract convergence". "It is one of the issues where an outcome at the Buenos Aires conference is possible," he noted. "That being said, some serious work will need to be done in Buenos Aires", he said.
For the other issues, Karau recommended that members "pursue a limited outcome" in the form of a post-Buenos Aires work programme. Issues falling into this category include domestic support, market access, and remaining issues of export competition.
Many members deplored the lack of progress on domestic support and said the trade ministers should focus on this issue in Buenos Aires.
Australia, New Zealand and Canada underlined their desire to see generalised domestic support limited that has a distortion effect on trade. Australia said that according to its calculation, members would have up to $1 trillion of trade distorting support entitlements and even partial use of the entitlement could be "catastrophic" to agricultural trade.
In addition, the hope of a special safeguard mechanism in agriculture for developing countries, which would enable them to raise their customs duties in cases of sudden spikes in massive imports, is weak, given the "wide divergence" between the members' negotiating positions, according to Karau. (Original version in French by Emmanuel Hagry)