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The Sixth WTO Ministerial Conference
Hong Kong, China, 13 to 18 December 2005.
SUMMARY OF
17 DECEMBER 2005
Day 5:
Revised
draft circulated, ministers comment
Ministers
headed for another long night of negotiations after a revised
draft ministerial declaration was circulated in the early
afternoon of 17 December. At an evening informal meeting of
the heads of delegations, they said the draft reflects further
achievements since the original was forwarded from meetings in
Geneva in November. They then got down to resolving remaining
differences in the text.
The text
reflects developments in the talks over the past few days in
three key subjects: agriculture, non-agricultural market
access, and specific development issues, including duty-free,
quota-free access for least-developed countries’ exports.
It emerged after ministers had spent most of the previous
night drafting and re-drafting, principally in the Chairman’s
Consultative Group, comprising about 30 to 40 delegations
representing all the alliances and other key players in the
negotiations. Members were given five hours to study the draft
before commenting on it in the heads of delegations meeting.
Ministers praised the process as being “bottom-up” (inputs
coming from the membership rather than proposed from the top,
i.e. the chairs). The revisions were based on texts received
by the “facilitators” in each subject (see Day 4 report for
list of facilitators) and discussed by members particularly in
the Chairman’s Consultative Group. Participants in this group
are responsible for coordinating positions with their allies
among the rest of the membership.
Heads
of delegations
Informal meeting 6.30 pm
The
revised draft was circulated jointly by Hong Kong’s Commerce,
Industry and Technology Secretary John Tsang, who chairs the
conference, and WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy. Introducing
the draft in the meeting, Secretary Tsang stressed that it is
very much still a draft. Nevertheless, it represents
significant progress from where the meeting began on Tuesday,
he said.
The main revisions in the text are in three subjects that have
been the principal focus of negotiations over the past few
days — agriculture, non-agricultural market access and
specific development issues, he said.
On agriculture, the text contains a number of changes while
maintaining the basic objective: to turn the broad agreements
currently achieved in the negotiations into something more
specific, he went on. This would guide the work in the coming
months on developing the detailed “modalities” that members
will need to negotiate.
He said the time had come for delegations to match rhetoric
with commitment in a bid to move the text forward still. He
said the outside world would not be forgiving if members fail
to deliver at this Ministerial Conference.
In non-agricultural market access, the wording is now clearer
on the tariff reduction formula, particularly on preferences
that are given with nothing required in return
(“non-reciprocal preferences”), and on small and vulnerable
economies, Secretary Tsang said. The text also recognizes the
need to ensure “commensurably” high levels of ambition in the
agriculture and non-agricultural market access — wording
designed to reassure countries that are reluctant to open
their markets by a large amount in one area without gaining
much market access in the other.
On development specific issues, the text reflects
significantly further progress on proposals for
least-developed countries to do with special treatment for
least-developed countries, contained in Annex F of the text.
On services, the suggested changes to the text reflect
concerns that some members have expressed about the draft that
came from Geneva, Secretary Tsang said. The changes are
principally to do with reaffirming and underscoring that Annex
C (the annex dealing with services) is not a prescription for
action in the negotiations, at the
same time
aligning the text even more closely with the General Agreement
on Trade in Services agreement and the Doha mandate for
services negotiations.
Overall: The chairman pointed out that all members had the
responsibility to use this Ministerial Conference to provide a
“launching pad”, or clear workable basis, for finishing the
round by the end of next year. The text to be agreed here in
Hong Kong would not be the end of the process but a catalyst
for further work in 2006 which will finalise the Doha
negotiations.
“There would be a heavy responsibility on anyone who lets this
chance slip away,” he said. He urged all members to reflect on
this point and the shared responsibility for success or
failure.
Together with the director-general and the facilitators,
Chairman Tsang said he intended to work with delegations in an
effort to resolve the differences that remain.
The discussion: Over 60 members spoke, directly or indirectly
representing almost the entire
membership.
Many delegations welcomed the new draft text for maintaining
the “bottom up” approach. They said that while it marks a
modest step forward, substantial work remains ahead in the new
year. It was also necessary to capture the progress made so
far, and produce results for the credibility of the WTO,
members said.
Delegations expressed disappointment with various sections of
the draft. As one delegation put it, the text fell short of
many of its aspirations but it was minimally acceptable.
In services, for example, some were disappointed with the lack
of ambition in the text while others were concerned that the
level was too high. This was repeated in other sections, like
agriculture and non-agricultural market access. Among the
issues raised were: the end date for agricultural export
subsidies, other forms of export
competition
including food aid, cotton, market access in agriculture,
including flexibilities for developing countries, the link
between agriculture and non-agricultural market access, a
number of issues in non-agricultural market access, including
the level of ambition and flexibilities, plurilateral
negotiations in services, least-developed country issues,
geographical indications, the relationship between the
intellectual property agreement and the Convention on
Biological Diversity.
Many delegations, however, expressed their desire to work with
others in the remaining few hours to make the Hong Kong
Ministerial a success. They resumed consultations on their
remaining differences in the Chairman’s Consultative Group at
close to midnight.
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