Despite gloomy media reports, a world trade deal might come
out of meetings in Singapore this week.
Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz is attending and has set up
a teleconference for late Thursday afternoon.
The negotiators made more progress during the last week of
November than over the previous five years, said Robert Azevedo,
director-general of the World Trade Organization.
The negotiations have dragged on for 12 years.
There appears to be general agreement on agricultural
issues, except for India’s insistence on concessions so it can continue to
subsidies longer than proposed by the others.
Azevedo said the number of issues in square brackets (points
where agreement remained to be reached) was reduced from about 2,000 to 59
during this recent set of negotiations that included an all-night session from
Sunday evening until Monday morning.
He said there are too many technical issues remaining to be
resolved for the trade ministers to resolve when they come together in
Singapore this week.
However, they could agree on a number of issues that have
been negotiated and that could result in significant trade agreements.
One of the key issues for Canadian farmers is agreement on
the administration of tariff-rate quotas. These are reduced tariffs for limited
volumes of imports and are a key feature of Canada’s ongoing protection for
dairy and poultry farmers.
Another area of agreement is on subsidies for agricultural
exports.
There
are nine texts that negotiators have almost completed including four for
agriculture and five for developing and least-developed countries.
This
round of World Trade negotiations began with the intention of helping poor
nations, especially their agriculture development by reducing rich-country farm
subsidies and reducing rich-country barriers to their export opportunities in
those countries.
At the
same time as trade ministers meet on the WTO negotiations, those involved in
the Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations will be looking at the significant
progress made so far during those negotiations.
A year
ago they talked about closing a deal by the end of this year and while they
seem to be close, it’s unlikely that a deal can be finalized for the ministers
to sign this week.
