Podcast Transcript

25 July 2006
The suspension of the Doha Trade Round.

Mark Tokola, Minister-Counselor for Economic Affairs at the US Embassy in London

On Monday, July 24, World Trade Organization Director-General Pascal Lamy announced that the Doha Round trade talks had been indefinitely suspended due to inability to bridge differences between participating countries.

We are disappointed by the collapse of the Doha Round. The United States went to Geneva prepared to reach an agreement that would not only benefit our own economy, but also lead to reduction in poverty around the world.

The World Bank estimated that 63% of trade gains for developing countries from a successful round would have come from agriculture and 93% of that benefit would have derived from greater market access, which was our key objective.

We regret that the G-8 mandate for increased market access has not been met. We are disappointed that key Ministers were unable to reach an agreement despite the strong encouragement from leaders during the G-8 Summit in St. Petersburg.

The United States has offered ambitious proposals and flexibility in order to demonstrate our commitment to the success of the Doha discussions. President Bush has said that he favors the elimination of tariffs, trade-distorting subsidies and other barriers to the free flow of goods and services as other nations do the same.

The United States played a critical role in launching the Doha Round, in getting it back on track following the Cancun Ministerial, in moving it forward last October with our ambitious agricultural proposal, and in sustaining that movement at the Hong Kong Ministerial.

The United States went to Geneva prepared to negotiate an agreement, but the G-8 mandate for increased market access was not met by offers from other countries.

Following the commitment of the G-8 leaders (plus the 7 invited developing countries: Brazil, China, South Africa, India, Congo, Mexico and Kazakhstan) at St. Petersburg, we hoped others would join U.S. in bringing the necessary flexibility to move these negotiations into their final stage.

Not only did the EU fail to come forward with any new market access, but they also criticized proposed U.S. cuts in domestic subsidies, while the EU already spends three times as much as the U.S. in trade-distorting agricultural support.

The U.S. is already well ahead of other countries on providing market access for agriculture products as evidenced by U.S. average tariff on agricultural products of 12% compared to EU's average of 24% and WTO members' average of 62%.

Moreover, many WTO members continued to insist on exclusions for sensitive products, special products, and special safeguards - "loopholes" that would undermine even the tariff cuts that ostensibly were being offered. The layers of loopholes revealed over the weekend in Geneva would result in even less markets access than we thought was on the table.

For example:

• Upon studying the EU's offer on beef, it became clear that they were offering to allow only 160,000 tons of beef exports to the world market, not the 800,000 tons they said was on offer.


• India's proposed loopholes would have exempted its market from imports of between 95-98% of agricultural products. Any developing country, and this includes already competitive countries such as Brazil or China on domestic agricultural support, could take advantage of this loophole.


• The U.S. did not seek any trade concessions from the least developed countries in the Doha Round, but we believe already competitive economies such as Brazil, China, and South Korea should be more open to competition.

The U.S. proposed to cut its most trade-distorting subsidies by 60%

The EU proposal would not have required any changes in its current farm programs.

We remain committee to a successful Doha Development agreement - one that creates real market openings, brings new economic opportunities, and opens markets for all World Trade Organization member countries. We remain committed to pursuing an agreement in agriculture, manufacturing and services that will open new markets for all members of the WTO.

We believe the multilateral process can be successful, and we are committed to these negotiations. The Uruguay Round discussions stopped and started a number of times before they concluded successfully. Similarly, we believe that these talks can begin again and produce a successful outcome.

U.S. Trade Representative Ambassador Schwab, Agriculture Secretary Johanns, among others will continue to be actively engaging other nations to search for ways to move forward and to meet the promise of the Doha round. Thank you for listening.

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