Trade talks in doubt, yet again

Trade Minister Andrew Robb urged delegates of the WTO to strike a deal to liberalise global trade.
Source: AAP

TRADE Minister Andrew Robb has urged delegates at a crucial World Trade Organisation meeting in Bali to strike a deal to liberalise global trade amid growing signs negotiations will once again fail.

Speaking in front of trade ministers and representatives from around the world, Mr Robb on Wednesday said that further delays in reaching a deal to reduce trade barriers would risk the credibility of the WTO.

Efforts to slash barriers to world trade and establish a global set of rules began with the so-called “Doha Round” in Qatar in 2001, but a deal has always remained out of reach amid ongoing disputes between rich and poor countries.

The comments came as India’s Anand Sharma earlier told delegates at the same plenary session that his country could not accept a proposal on food security under a package being considered.

A proposal that New Delhi feels could endanger its efforts to subsidise food in the huge nation “cannot be accepted”, Mr Sharma said.

“Agriculture sustains millions of subsistence farmers. Their interests must be secured. Food security is essential for four billion people of the world,” he added.

“Yes, we have rejected it,” he later told reporters, calling it a “final decision”.

But Mr Robb warned that it was developing nations that had the most to lose if a deal was not struck by Friday, when the summit is scheduled to wrap up.

“For the first time since the WTO was established nearly 20 years ago, we can see the prospects of a first-harvest outcome from the Doha negotiations, and we must seize that opportunity,” Mr Robb said.

“If we succeed this week, we will pave the way for more ambitious negotiations and the promise of significant growth in income and jobs around the world.”

“The cost of failure this week will fall most on developing countries who will lose the opportunity to boost sustainable economic growth and jobs.”

Despite India’s position casting doubt over whether the summit would finally deliver a deal, other delegates continued to talk up prospects of a successful conclusion to negotiations that have already been underway for 12 years.

United States Trade Representative Michael Froman said an agreement in Bali would prove to a sceptical world that the WTO was a vital institution, while also warning the talks in Bali were “perilously close to a different path”.

“In the past few weeks in Geneva we have crept closer to disaster on multiple occasions, yet at each moment of crisis, the vast majority of members considered the consequences of failure, pulled back from the brink and pulled together instead,” Mr Froman said.

“Leaving Bali this week without an agreement would deal a debilitating blow to the WTO as a forum for multilateral negotiations. If that happens, the unfortunate truth is the loss would be felt most heavily by those members who can least afford it.”

Mr Robb told delegates that Australia would support “whatever steps are necessary” to finalise the WTO package by Friday.

“We all have a collective responsibility to ourselves and to the multilateral trade system to conclude the package by the end of this week,” he said.

The main stumbling block to completing a deal, Mr Robb said, was agriculture.

The WTO’s insistence that any deal should be unanimous has also been blamed as a reason for the organisation’s failure to reach an agreement.

It has been estimated that a successful conclusion to talks in Bali could eventually add tens of millions of jobs across the globe, of which many would be created in developing countries.

Mr Robb was expected to hold a bilateral meeting with Indonesian Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan on Thursday on the sidelines of WTO summit, which is scheduled to wrap up on Friday.

The trade minister was expected to travel to Singapore for another round of talks on Saturday on the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact, seen by some delegates at the Bali summit as an impediment to the WTO deal being struck.

Trade talks in doubt, yet again