WTO Mini-Ministerial In Egypt June 21-22 To Focus On Market Access, Other Issues
International Trade Daily ISSN 1533-1350 News
An informal 'mini-ministerial' meeting of the World Trade Organization scheduled to take place in Egypt next month is expected to focus on efforts being made to reach agreement on opening markets to a range of goods and services as well as to resolving differences over access to medicines for poorer countries, officials said May 15.
Attending the meeting--one of several being held in the run-up to the WTO ministerial conference set for Sept. 10-14 in Cancun, Mexico-- will be trade ministers from about two dozen of the WTO's 146 WTO members, including U.S. Trade Representative Robert B. Zoellick and European Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy.
U.S. trade officials said that Zoellick will also be stopping in Jordan while in the region to participate in a roundtable discussion at a meeting of the World Economic Forum--scheduled for June 21-23-- where he will set out in detail the U.S. proposal to create a Middle East Free Trade Area over the next decade, as outlined by President Bush on May 9.
The officials said that the WTO 'mini-ministerial' set to be held next month--in the Egyptian Red Sea resort city of Sharm el-Sheikh June 21-22--will follow similar meetings that were held in Sydney, Australia, last November and in Tokyo last February and will precede a 'mini-ministerial' being planned for Montreal toward the end of July, which is expected to be the final such meeting prior to the ministerial conference set for Cancun this September.
Supporters of the 'mini-ministerial' process, including Zoellick and Lamy, have argued that it tends to keep top trade officials fully engaged in WTO issues and this year will help pave the way for a smooth ministerial meeting in Cancun.
Provisional Agenda
A provisional agenda for the Sharm el-Sheikh meeting next month--a copy of which was obtained by BNA--calls for Zoellick and the other trade ministers to spend the first day of the two-day gathering discussing market access for goods and services--with one two-hour session devoted to agriculture, another to non-agriculture products, and a final session focusing on services, such as banking and insurance. The agenda for the second day of the Sharm el-Sheikh meeting proposes that trade ministers spend four hours discussing access to medicines (TRIPs and public health) and so-called special and differential treatment for developing countries in the WTO--one two-hour session on the former, a second on the latter.
U.S. officials said that the focus of the meeting dovetails with U.S. objectives for the WTO talks, noting that Zoellick has repeatedly called for market access to be at the core of the discussions.
Four-Point Plan
Zoellick said May 8, in fact, that he and Lamy have agreed on a four-point plan for moving the non-agriculture WTO negotiations forward that focuses on market access as the key. He said that the plan, in particular, would focus WTO attention on reducing tariffs on manufactured goods using a yet-unspecified 'harmonizing formula'; cutting tariffs to zero in specific sectors; eliminating all tariffs below a certain level (the United States has proposed 5 percent, the EU has suggested 2 percent); and providing special and differential treatment for developing countries.
Zoellick said at a news conference in Berlin, Germany, on April 30 that the proposal--developed in meetings he had with Lamy in Europe last month where they both participated in the annual ministerial meeting of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) April 29-30--was meant to focus attention on a 'limited set of issues' for the WTO meeting in Cancun.
'[T]he work that we have in Geneva [at the WTO] is very important,' Zoellick said. 'But the issues we are now struggling with are a combination of policy and politics and you have to get ministers involved. And if you are going to get ministers involved with all these countries, you really have to focus on a limited set of issues.'
By Gary G. Yerkey
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