Archive

The Bush administration remains committed to the stalled Free Trade Area of the Americas but the issue of U.S. farm subsidies and support policies should be dealt with at the World Trade Organization.

The United States and the Philippines last week concluded meetings under the bilateral Trade and Investment Framework Agreement, during which they discussed the full range of bilateral issues and coordinated on the World Trade Organization Doha Development Agenda negotiations

Incoming World Trade Organization Director General Pascal Lamy is preparing to go 'full steam ahead' into an intensive negotiating phase of the Doha Development Agenda by directing the chairs of the agriculture and industrial market access negotiations commence text-based negotiations without delay

At the WTO's Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) on 28 July, severaldeveloping countries expressed many concerns about the state and substance of the WTO negotiations, as well as the process which theyfound to be not transparent or participatory.(M.Khor)

The WTO General Council meeting ended on 29 July without any of the anticipated results of additional agreements (or 'first approximations') on key aspects of the Doha work programme

The World Trade Organization rejected European Union plans to triple its banana import tariff

At the 'somber' conclusion of last week's World Trade Organization General Council meeting, GC Chair Amina Mohamed unveiled a new 'blueprint' aimed at quickly transforming the Doha trade negotiations.

Farm policy chiefs of the European Union and the defensive Group-of-10 coalition on Friday signaled their opposition to cap high farm tariffs as suggested in the 'middle ground' market access formula of the Group-of-20 countries

The Chair of the WTO Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) Dr. Supachai Panitchpakdi, at a meeting of the TNC on 28 July, summed up the situation in the negotiations on the Doha work programme as 'disappointing but not disastrous'.

Something that's been kept quiet is how Congress will decide by Sept.16 to cut $3 billion in Agriculture Department programs during the next five years including $173 million in the fiscal year that starts Oct. 1.