Doha talks are back on the table

DAVOS: It is official ��� the World Trade Organisation���s Doha Round talks are back on track. Thirty trade ministers met at Davos on the outskirts of the annual summit of the World Economic Forum on Saturday to decide whether the frozen trade liberalisation talks could resume.

At the venue of the informal WTO ministerial meetings chairwoman, Swiss trade minister Doris Leuthard and WTO DG Pascal Lamy informed newsmen that ���We could register renewed commitment to put the Doha round on track.���

���Today���s meeting gave a clear signal that the Doha negotiations shall resume on a full scale basis in Geneva. It is living, it is dynamic. It will go out,��� said the optimistic Swiss trade minister. ���This informal meeting has timely brought substantial issues on the table and the critical time frame ahead of us. The fact that it could take place today is already a success. The discussion brought welcome clarification about where we stand and how the process can be brought forward. I am convinced that today���s meeting gives a new impetus to the negotiating process.���

However, commerce and industry minister Kamal Nath was cautiously optimistic and specified that India was not going to let its subsistence farmers down and a lot of progress depended on what was finally on the table. He also said the development dimension would have to be considered in all issues.

Brazil���s foreign minister Celso Amorin told ET this was ���the best meeting at Davos on the Doha talks��� he had experienced. He added that technical talks would resume in Geneva immediately.

The Chair of the Services Negotiations, the Mexican Ambassador to the WTO, did confirm that he was prepared to resume the talks soon. Swiss trade minister Doris Leuthard confirmed that in order to take advantage of the window of opportunity for making substantial progress, the talks would be resumed soon on a technical level at the WTO headquarters.

She observed there was also a readiness of ministers to meet in Geneva, and there was a comprehensive approach to reach broad-based results on all issues and not just concentrate on agriculture and NAMA. In order to do so, it was decided that flexibility would be a key word to reach a balanced result. It was recognised that transparency was important, and participants stressed the importance of the development dimension.

WTO���s DG Pascal Lamy said that ���As expected, this was not a meeting where ministers negotiated on numbers or framing the next steps.��� He said these were the strong signals sent out by the trade ministers for de-frosting the frozen trade talks.