SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt - Frustrated by inaction, the head of the World Trade Organization said Saturday he hasn't seen the "political will" among government ministers to resolve differences over opening international trade on farm products.
Three months after they missed a self-imposed deadline to agree on a blueprint for agriculture, the ministers at an informal meeting of World Trade Organization members struggled to find any common ground over the future of trade in agricultural goods.
WTO Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi told the meeting that time is running out and "the time for posturing and positioning is over," according to WTO spokesman Keith Rockwell. "Countries need to be realistic about what can be done."
Rockwell said Panitchpakdi told the trade ministers, "We have seen no change in positions of any significant degree. We haven't seen any political will."
The WTO is negotiating to reduce barriers to international trade in a wide range of areas including agriculture, manufactured goods and services like banking and telecommunications. The "round," or current phase of talks, was launched in November 2001 and is supposed to be completed by the end of next year, but the body's 146 members have already missed a series of deadlines.
Much of the blame for the agriculture problem fell on the European Union, which is in the midst of difficult internal negotiations to reform its $50 billion farm subsidy program. Many countries say those sums make it impossible for their producers to compete with EU exports.
"It has become quite clear that whether we move ahead or get stuck very much depends on the EU," said U.S. Trade Representative Robert Zoellick. "We will need to see how any EU policy changes in agriculture translate into ... results."
The United States says it has made substantial offers to cut its own farm support and import tariffs, but the EU says Washington too pays out billions of dollars to its farmers.
Brussels also wants to see some of its concerns taken into account, including animal welfare, consumer safety and protection of the environment and rural communities. It also is demanding rights to use place names to identify food traditionally made there — such as Roquefort cheese or Parma ham.
But while the two major trading powers fight it out, many developing countries say their concerns are being forgotten.
"Today, for us, it is a matter of survival," said Senegalese Trade Minister Aichatou Agne Pouye. It's time that the U.S. and Europe agree on subsidies. This is a strong message."
Some poor and small nations, including Senegal, are concerned that the advantage they get from special low import duties in rich countries will be eroded if big cuts in duties are made across the board.
India, meanwhile, has said it is not prepared to slash duties on farm products because it has to protect the 650 million Indians who depend on farming.
"We can't compete with a highly subsidized farmer — that would be a complete distortion," said Indian Commerce Minister Arun Jaitley. "Therefore my level of ambition is to protect our farmers. Market access comes later."
On Sunday's agenda is a discussion of how to ensure that developing countries can afford patented drugs to treat diseases like HIV/AIDS and whether to add four new topics of negotiation to the current round of talks. The proposed new topics include rules on foreign investment and on competition policies.
The meeting is supposed to be a preparatory session before a gathering of all 146 WTO members in Cancun, Mexico, in September.
But without agreement on agriculture there is little chance of agreement in other areas, and most accept that the meeting is unlikely to solve that problem.
Asked what he hoped to get out of the meeting, Switzerland's chief trade negotiator Luzius Wasescha said, "Well, it's a nice get-together. And apart from the personal memories we will all have a nice group photograph."
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