Brussels, 03/12/2008 (Agence Europe) - In a fax sent to them on Monday 1 December, Director-General of the WTOPascal Lamy called on the trade ministers of some 30 countries to be ready to go to Geneva from 13-15 December for a meeting aiming to validate a compromise on the details for the liberalisation of trade in agriculture and industrial goods (NAMA). This was not, however, an official convocation, as Mr Lamy will not take his final decision until the end of this week on whether to hold a new ministerial meeting, after the unsuccessful one in July of this year (EUROPE 9714). The WTO boss, who is supported in his endeavours by the European Trade Commissioner Catherine Ashton (EUROPE 9795), is awaiting the revised compromise texts from the heads of the negotiating groups, Crawford Falconer for agriculture and Luzius Wasescha for NAMA. On Tuesday 2 December, Mr Wasescha announced that the question of sectorals, which aim, on the basis of the voluntary participation of a number of member states, to introduce major reductions, or even the complete removal, of customs duty from 14 industrial sectors, including automotives, electronics, chemical products, machines and textiles, "is causing serious problems". Quoting a negotiator, Mr Wasescha warned that there was a risk that this issue, which must be dealt with by the ministers, could become for any meeting held this December what the special safeguard mechanism (SSM) for agriculture of the developing countries was for the July meeting. Additionally, speaking through the Mali trade minister, Ahmadou Abdoulaye Diallo, the C4 cotton producing countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Mali and Chad) on Tuesday threatened not to sign any global agreement unless the question of cotton is resolved. Cotton was not raised in July, much to the anger of the African producers, who are calling for an end to subsidies paid by the United States ($2.5 billion a year) and the EU (€300 million a year) to their cotton producers, which creates trade distortions, weighs down the world exchange rates and penalises producers from the poor countries. This question was already the subject of a special meeting at the WTO last week under the aegis of Mr Lamy and will be discussed again next week. (E.H./transl.fl)