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Journalism of Courage
Troubled world trade talks missed another deadline on Wednesday with no deal reached on how to cut tariffs on industrial goods, envoys said. World Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiations, launched at 2001-end to give a boost to a flagging global economy, have already run into trouble over farm goods and setting aside patent laws for poorer states to buy cheaper medicines for diseases such as AIDS.
On the table was a draft plan presented by Girard for across-the-board cuts in tariffs, which aimed to satisfy the demands of both the rich and developing countries amongst the World Trade Organisation’s 145 member states. It included a complex formula for lowering all duties, while in certain sectors — Girard listed seven — States should aim to eliminate tariffs altogether within three years, with rich states doing it within 12 months. The sectors were electronics and electrical goods, fish and fish products, footwear, leather goods, motor vehicle parts, precious stones and metals and textiles and clothing.
The blueprint has further recommended that WTO states abolished all duties that were already low, although it did not say where the bar should be set. Poorer developing countries, the 49 least developed countries or LDCs, would be excluded from the targets for the tariff cuts, although they would be expected to make some minimum reductions.
But some of the trade organisation’s poorest states are worried that lowering barriers to trade could make it more difficult for them to sell their goods, which often now benefit from special treatment in rich states. Many richer states, however, such as the United States and New Zealand, had wanted sharper cuts with the aim of eventually doing away with tariffs altogether.
‘‘For some it was too ambitious, for others not ambitious enough. But I do not think that there was a total rejection of it,’’ Girard said. (Reuters)
