Brussels, 21/04/2006 (Agence Europe) - Before the three days of talks at the farm negotiating committee in Geneva had even finished (see EUROPE 9175), the TWO decided on Friday morning to organise a meeting on 24 April of ambassadors of the 149 WTO Member States to decide on how to continue the negotiations a week ahead of the 30 April deadline, when figures and other details of the negotiations are supposed to be agreed on farm products and manufactured goods (NAMA). No agenda has been set, but Member States are expected to decide to keep the end of April deadline, but agreement seemed far from in the bag on Friday. Diplomatic sources suggest that the WTO Member States are asking whether trade ministers should meet in Geneva on 29 and 30 April only to confirm their disagreement, or whether it would be better to postpone the deadline to a later date, some time before the end of July. Only Australia, Brazil, the United States and Japan seemed to favour holding a meeting of ministers at the end of April. A Green Room meeting (of around two dozen ambassadors) was scheduled for Friday evening to look at the question.
Visiting Finland on Friday, EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson was pessimistic about the potential of meeting the deadline decided upon at the Hong Kong Summit last December. At a press conference in Helsinki, he said it was becoming clearer that agreement could not be reached within deadline which raised the question of the utility of a new ministerial meeting in Geneva next week on an agreement that we know will not be reached on time. Mandelson accused the United States and emerging economies in the G20 group to being unrealistic and thereby jeopardising the talks. He said 'the US is demanding that the EU makes a combination of further cuts in agricultural subsidies and tariffs that would tower over what may be envisaged in the US.' Mandelson said that the EU has cut domestic aid and agreed to scrap export refund by 2013, but the US has not yet cut a single dollar from its constantly expanding farm subsidy programme despite calling for the EU to agree on new cuts in its subsidies: If accepted, these cuts would make agricultural production impossible to sustain even on Europe's present scaled-down version of the CAP… It would also wipe out the vast bulk of the preferential agricultural export trade of the poorest developing countries with Europe.' Meanwhile Brazil, a leading emerging economy, is refusing to make any new concessions on the NAMAs until the EU improves its offer on access for farm products.
On the same day, the 133 Committee of Member States' experts on trade issues (where the Commission spoke of a complete breakdown in the WTO negotiations on NAMAs in Geneva), France said there was no way new farm concessions could be made. It was backed by Italy, Greece, Poland and Portugal.