Doha Highlight - 9
14 November
The 4th WTO Ministerial Conference closed here Wednesday evening, adopting a Doha Development Agenda, a comprehensive set of trade negotiations that mark a great advance in terms of the fiasco the world's Trade Ministers saw in Seattle two years ago.
There was no real unanimity on how to describe the Doha package. In press briefings immediately after the closing ceremony, the WTO Director General Mike Moore slipped between using the terms "Doha Development Agenda" and the "Doha Round." Some Ministers felt it was not really important what term was used to describe the final compromise package that was achieved after all.
In the end of the negotiations, which prevented many Trade Ministers from having a normal dose of sleep over a week, it was a hectic exercise in compromise to accommodate India's concern that there should be no rush to proceed to negotiations on the four Singapore issues where many developing countries were just not prepared.
The insistence of the Indian Trade Minister not to join any consensus on going ahead "up-front" in terms of negotiations on investment and competition, transparency in government procurement and trade facilitation, also got formal support from a handful of other developing countries.
What caused a lot of confusion was the way this compromise has been accommodated. Speaking to reporters, Indian Trade Minister Murasoli Maran said the concerns of the developing countries on these new issues had now been taken on board by way of a "clarification" that was issued by the Chairman of the Doha Conference, Minister Kemal of Qatar.
This `clarification' has now to be read along with the latest Draft of the Ministerial Declaration which was adopted without any further objections from any party. Asked why this was not included in the Declaration itself, Minister Maran said probably because of lack of time (and fatigue perhaps). To repeated questions of the kind of pressures that were brought on to him in the last days, including a reported phone call from Prime Minister Tony Blair, Minister Maran laughed off the mater saying it was nothing special in the case of the WTO as such pressures were usually brought to bear on so many other international conferences.
The basic compromise that has now been achieved on the new issues, according to Minister Maran, is that these new issues will be kept on a study mode and that now negotiations on them are not "up-front."
Following is the text of the short clarification that the Chairman of the Conference gave, not in his personal capacity, but as representing the whole WTO membership at its highest level possible:
"I would like to note that some delegations have requested clarification concerning paragraphs 20,23,26 and 27 of the Draft Declaration. Let me say that with respect to the reference to an `explicit consensus' being needed, in these paragraphs, for a decision to be taken at the Fifth Session of the Ministerial Conference, my understanding is that, at that Session, a decision would indeed need to be taken, by explicit consensus before negotiations on Trade and Investment and Trade and Competition Policy, Transparency in Government Procurement, and Trade Facilitation could proceed.
In my view, this would give each Member the right to take a position on modalities that would prevent negotiations from proceeding after the Fifth Session of the Ministerial Conference until that Member is prepared to join in an explicit consensus."
While Mr. Mike Moore said it was "new beginning" for the WTO in terms of the expanded work programme that has been agreed to in Doha. He described the package attained in Doha as one "riddled" with developmental concerns. In his press briefing, Pascal Lamy, European Commissioner for Trade added that it was not just Development but `Sustainable development' that would be promoted.
Questioned by the South Bulletin on the different terminology being adopted to describe the Doha Conference package - `Development Agenda' and "Development Round", Mr. Robert B. Zoellick, the United States Trade Representative said the `concept' was more important and paid tribute to the Tanzanian Trade Minister Idi Simba in helping in this process.
Asked about the view of the pharmaceutical industry that the Doha Declaration on TRIPS and Public Health was just a `political' declaration and not legally binding, Mr. Zoellcik said it was important to demonstrate that the TRIPS Agreement was not a problem and that it was part of the solution to the health crisis affecting millions and that the WTO was sensitive to their concerns.
While it was difficult to establish contact with other Ministers from the developing countries for immediate comment, the NGO community did not share as much in the enthusiasm exhibited by the WTO DG or the EU and the United States. Oxfam said it was a victory on public health but there were few other gains for people in poverty.
The World Development Movement (WDM)condemned the Doha Ministerial Declaration as a "disaster for the world's poor." Barry Coates, Director of the UK-based WDM said, "The much hyped development round is empty of development. This massive extension of the WTO is both reckless and dangerous. It will further undermine the WTO's legitimacy. The cost of current trade agreements is already being counted in people's lives. Developing countries do not have the capacity or the wish to negotiate these new agreements."
