[asia-apec 1458] The Age (Melbourne) 6/6/00

[APEC Monitoring Group]

             WORLD    
                         
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            Next WTO round of trade talks 18 months away    
            
            By TIM COLEBATCH 
            ECONOMICS EDITOR
            DARWIN 
            Wednesday 7 June 2000 
            R E L A T E D
                                Apec affirms faith in liberalisation
                                 
                         
             

            The launch of a new round of negotiations to liberalise world trade rules could be as much as 18 months away, the WTO's director-general, Mike Moore, warned yesterday, despite some progress in narrowing the gaps exposed by last year's failure in Seattle. 

            In a frank breakfast discussion, Mr Moore said the chances of getting a round under way this year were now no better than 20 per cent. While governments insisted they would like to get the negotiations started soon, he said, they had yet to show the flexibility needed to achieve this.

            "There has been progress, but it's slow and it's glacial", the WTO chief said. "The atmosphere in Geneva is a lot better. We do have agriculture (negotiations) under way, even if with a few wobbles. We do have services (negotiations) under way. We do have a package for the least developed countries. 

            "But the great national interest stakes haven't changed that dramatically. There has been some narrowing of the gap on a few of those positions, but the movement is very subtle." 

            On his first official visit to Australia since taking up the job last September, Mr Moore yesterday briefed Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum trade ministers on progress in the informal discussions he has had in Geneva and elsewhere. He urged them to add "some modest momentum" by reaffirming their support for a comprehensive new round, including tariffs on manufactures, and by imposing a moratorium on e-commerce tariffs. The US proposal for APEC ministers to impose such a moratorium is also supported by Australia. Ministers had agreed in principle to a moratorium in Seattle, but the deal lapsed when they failed to agree on a new round. 

            A knockabout, irreverent former New Zealand Labor leader, Trade Minister and briefly Prime Minister, Mr Moore has been left to pick up the pieces of global trade reform after last December's meeting of trade ministers in Seattle failed in its goal of launching a comprehensive round of negotiations to liberalise virtually every area of world trade. Yesterday he hinted that the most likely time for the new round to be launched would be when trade ministers met sometime next year. There is as yet no date or venue for the meeting, and Mr Moore indicated he was in no hurry to set them. 

            He said he would not convene the next meeting of ministers until he was convinced that governments were close to agreement on the key issues that led to failure in Seattle:

            The WTO's future role in the "new issues" of labor rights, the environment, competition policy and investment rules.

            Reform of the anti-dumping rules, which developing countries allege are being used to discriminate against their exports.

            Review of the timetable for revenue-strapped developing countries to implement the tariff cuts agreed to in the Uruguay Round.

            Conflict between Europe and the US/Cairns Group alliance over whether the negotiations would encompass the abolition of farm export subsidies. 

            Mr Moore said Seattle had failed because not enough preparatory work had been put into securing agreement on these issues before the meeting began.

            "We can stitch some things up at two minutes to midnight, but we can't stitch up too much," he said. 

            So far, he said, the main movement post-Seattle had been on implementation issues, with Japan and the WTO itself developing programs to assist developing countries to meet their commitments, and in "confidence-building measures" such as the recent 15-nation initiative to open up market access for the 47 least developed countries. 

            The Clinton administration's wins in getting Congress to approve China's admission to the WTO and open US markets wider for products from Africa, Central America and the Caribbean had also helped to regenerate enthusiasm for trade reform, he said. 

            But while key Administration figures such as Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and US Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky had told him they wanted the new round to be launched before they left office next January, the test would be how much they were prepared to move to achieve this. 

            "We can't assemble ministers again with so many points of difference still to be settled," Mr Moore said. "We won't do it." One positive sign was that both Vice-President Al Gore and his Republican rival, Governor George W. Bush, were united in supporting a new round. 


            Sources say Mr Moore has been pushing for more openness in WTO decision-making, and a greater focus on the needs of developing countries. 

            Since the riots in Seattle propelled him into the world spotlight as the chief spokesman for globalisation, life for this witty, hard-living former Kiwi politician is no longer so easy. 

            Even in Darwin he is being shadowed by two huge security guards wherever he goes, and around the world, globalisation now has become a prime target of demonstrations. 


            
              
             

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