Global Policy Forum

By Ramesh Jaura

Activists from non-governmental organisations and media representatives from around the world celebrated the collapse of the world trade talks Sunday, but senior diplomats and trade officials expressed "mixed feelings".

A question uppermost on their minds was whether the failure was inevitable. Uncertainty also prevailed about the impact the 'Cancun debacle' might have on international diplomacy. The fate of multilateralism also appeared to be hanging in the balance.

The emotional involvement of sections of the international media representatives in the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial conference was unprecedented. This was highlighted by the fact that a large number of journalists gathered in the press conference hall joined NGO activists outside in giving a thunderous applause to Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorin when he admired the cohesion the developing countries had displayed in Cancun. Amorin coordinated the Group of 20 - meanwhile comprising 30 developing countries that had come up soon after the WTO ministerial session triggered off on Sep. 10. The group included India and China. Amorin praised the role of the media and NGO activists in promoting the cause of the developing countries.

The basic tenor of the NGO reaction was to hold the European Union and the U.S. responsible for the breakdown of talks. "This was the only option for the developing countries," Barry Coates, director of the World Development Movement said. "They have been bullied, ignored and marginalised. Quite simply, walking out was better than the deal on the table. The U.S. and the EU played Russian roulette with the WTO, and the bullet was in the chamber." Friends of the Earth International said in a statement: "No deal is better than a bad deal. Despite intense pressure from the business lobbies and bullying by the European Union and the U.S., developing countries have stood their ground."

The immediate reason for the collapse of talks was the failure to resolve serious differences between the rich and poor nations. Many developing countries, including the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group, the African Union, the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) and Asian countries such as India and Malaysia said they would like the conference not to launch negotiations on the 'Singapore issues'. The issues emerging from the Singapore conference in December 1996 relate to investment, competition, government procurement and trade facilitation.

The developing countries stood firm even after the EU agreed to drop two of these issues and retain on the agenda trade facilitation, considered key to small and medium enterprises, and transparency in public procurement. Roberto Bissio, director of the Uruguay-based Social Watch said this was not surprising. The Doha Development Agenda agreed two years ago in the capital of Qatar clearly stated that the Singapore issues would be discussed only after "an explicit consensus" had been reached. But that had clearly not happened, he said.

The chairman of the WTO conference, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Derbez said the persistence of the developing countries not to budge had prompted him to declare the talks a failure. Among the questions being asked at press conferences Sunday was whether the 'Cancun debacle' was inevitable.

A widespread view was that Derbez could have responded positively to the suggestion of the developing countries to take up the issue of agricultural reform further. That subject had been at the centre of negotiations for the previous four days. The fact that he did not do so remained a subject of debate. Asked for possible reasons, Derbez said he did not see any possibility of reaching a consensus even if the talks would have been extended beyond Sunday.

Why has this not worked?
EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy had his own explanation. "Despite the commitment of many able people, the WTO remains a medieval organisation," he said. "The procedures and rules of this organisation have not supported the weight of the task. There is no way to structure and steer discussions amongst 146 members in a manner conducive to consensus," Lamy told media representatives. He said the decision-making needed to be revamped and that the EU would continue to work in that direction within the WTO.

Director of the Third World Network Martin Khor went a step further: "The deeper reason is the untransparent and undemocratic system of drafting of texts in the WTO. The decision-making system in the WTO should be reformed so that there is more transparency and democracy, so that developing country members can participate more effectively, especially in the drafting of texts." Khor pleaded for setting up a special committee in the WTO to carry out democratic reforms, which were promised four years ago in Seattle. That meeting also ended in a fiasco, without the ministers agreeing on a text.

A senior trade official who did not wish to be named, said that though the failure of the talks was "nothing new" in the history of WTO, it was cause for "great concern". He feared that Africa, already marginalised in the international trading system, "now faces the danger of being isolated." By last Friday, African developing countries had entered into an Alliance that comprises the ACP, the African Union and also the LDCs. The Alliance includes 92 countries, 61 of which belong to the WTO. By forming the Alliance they had hoped to further their interests. "But what has emerged is just the contrary," the trade official told IPS.

An expert on international diplomacy who also did not wish to be named, welcomed that "the developing countries have organised themselves better this time and have shown that they are not ready to be bullied into accepting decisions which they are opposed to." The developed countries should respect the emergence of the developing countries in the system and re-think the way they operate, he told IPS. But the question was whether by turning down the EU offer they had not lost "an opportunity to sink the Singapore issues." He also expressed doubts whether, in spite of the cohesion displayed in Cancun, the developing countries had a medium and long-term strategy. It was not clear either how long they would stick together.

The U.S. Trade Representative Robert B. Zoellick and German Economic Affairs Minister Wolfgang Clement reinforced these reflections at separate press conferences. They said that after the collapse of talks, several developing countries had approached them for bilateral trade arrangements. In fact, Zoellick said Sunday that "some larger developing countries" which had been pursuing "tactics of inflexibility and inflammatory rhetoric" had got down to negotiate shortly before the talks were ended abruptly. But many smaller developing countries that followed the larger developing countries' lead "couldn't make the turn."

Zoellick mentioned China, Uruguay, Sri Lanka and Panama as "four very different countries" all of which, along with the United States, had sent the message that "each had a responsibility to try to move beyond rhetoric to try to reach creative solutions." Observers noted that China that had demonstratively joined what was then G- 20 last Friday, kept quiet Sunday.

What after Cancun?
The WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi, who expressed "disappointment" at the failure, said he hoped that a meeting of senior officials of the WTO member states would be convened "no later than December 15, 2003" in Geneva. The meeting would aim "to take the action necessary at that stage to enable us to move towards a successful and timely conclusion of the negotiations." Though Cancun had failed, the Doha Development Agenda remained intact, he said. Official representatives of the EU, the U.S. and Japan shared the view.

Meanwhile, an independent international NGO, 'Human Rights in China', said in a press statement Sunday: "China may have maintained a low profile at its first WTO ministerial conference in Cancun, but it will move centre stage when the sixth WTO Ministerial is hosted by Hong Kong." The WTO secretariat told IPS that no date has been fixed for that meeting yet.

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