Trade talks seek breakthrough on poor country deal

By William Schomberg

HONG KONG (Reuters) – Weary negotiators faced a fourth day
of talks on Friday with time beginning to run short in their
search for even a slimmed-down deal that could revive a
flagging global trade push.

Deep differences between Europe and the United States and
other countries have so far frustrated hopes of a package of
measures to give the world’s poorest countries more access to
wealthy markets.

The development package had been billed as a first step
toward a World Trade Organization (WTO) round but officials
concede they risk running out of time for a deal before their
conference ends on Sunday.

“The credibility of this ministerial conference is at stake
… we should not drag our feet,” European Trade Commissioner
Peter Mandelson said during a break in the talks on Thursday.

Officials have already conceded they will have to leave
until next year much of the hard bargaining on the core
elements of the WTO round, which like its predecessors has been
beset by years of wrangling.

Most countries say responsibility lies with Europe to make
further sacrifices on agricultural trade, but it insists it has
gone far enough already.

Brussels now wants a reform of U.S. food aid which it says
is a back-door way for American farmers to sell their excess
crops. And it says fast-growing poor nations such as Brazil and
India must cut barriers for industrial goods and services.

Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim, who heads the G20
group of developing countries, refused to budge, saying it was
up to Europe to prove its commitment to farm reform by agreeing
a date for the end of its farm export subsidies.

“The ball is already in front of the goal posts. It just
needs a small touch to put it in the net,” the Brazilian told
reporters after hours of slow talks.

PROTESTORS GATHER

Outside the heavily guarded conference center, perched on
the shore of Hong Kong’s bay, riot police were in place ahead
of what anti-free trade protestors promised a rough day.

“Today our actions are peaceful … tomorrow we will show a
different phase of this struggle to smash the WTO,” Park
Min-ung, general secretary of the Korean Peasants League,
representing South Korea’s 4 million farmers, said on Thursday.

His group is opposed to allowing more imports of rice into
South Korea which could hurt farmers livelihoods there.

Japan, ironically a global trading power, is also reluctant
to allow in more rice imports under a zero-tariff, zero-quota
plan for the world’s 49 poorest countries which is being
discussed by rich nations within the development package.

Japan protects its historic rice market with very high
customs tariffs. It hopes to exempt rice from the plan and
instead increase its aid program for poor exporters.

“We are aware of the international pressure on one hand and
the political and social needs of … farmers in Japan on the
other,” Japan’s top negotiator at the WTO, Seiichi Kondo, said.

Washington has been pressed not to exempt textile shipments
to the United States from fast-growing exporters Bangladesh and
Cambodia from the tariff-free, quota-free plan.

“They are both very competitive,” said a senior U.S. trade
official. “We are going to have to balance domestic sensitivity
with their ambitions.”

The United States has also been under fire over the $4
billion of subsidies it spends each year on its cotton
producers which farmers in West Africa say leaves them no room
to compete.

(Additional reporting by John Ruwitch)