. /.RESTRICTEDWORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/AG/NG/W/7
4 April 2000
(00-1368)
Committee on Agriculture
Special SessionOriginal:  English
FIRST SPECIAL SESSION OF THE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE
23-24 MARCH 2000
Statement by the United States
We appreciate your hard work over the last several months and your willingness to serve as
our chair for this meeting.  We recognize this process has entailed substantial effort on your part and
look forward to productive collaboration with you on your new duties.
The United States shares the strong interest of developed and developing countries that have
spoken here regarding the upcoming agriculture negotiations.  Further reform of global agricultural
policies, in particular trade policies, is central to the long term health and productivity of the US
agricultural sector.  We have identified a number of times our interest in specific reforms to increase
the market orientation of world agricultural trade by  reducing barriers to trade and distancing support
policies from production incentives.  The Uruguay Round agreement provided us with a first step
toward a more rational and fair agricultural trading system.  We all committed to ourselves in
Article 20 to work toward the "long-term objective of substantial progressive reductions in support
and protection resulting in fundamental reform."  These negotiations are the best opportunity for us to
move forward on the work begun at Marrakesh.
We will be active participants in these negotia tions and look forward to working with all
delegations interested in meaningful reform.  Agriculture will be at the centre of our work in the WTO
this year, both as we work to launch a broader trade Round and as we advance the work on the
mandated negotiations.  We encourage the active participation of all Members, as we all stand to gain
from reforms in agricultural policies, and the more expeditious our work the sooner we will harvest
those benefits.  In that regard, we have already held consultations with a broad range of Members on
the work for this the first Special Session.  These consultations and the comments I hear today suggest
that it should be possible to reach agreement on key elements of our agenda for this year, in particular
on issues related to the work plan for the Special Session and timelines for submitting negotiating
proposals.
Work Plan
We believe it is essential that useful work begin this year in the Special Session.  We support
the establishment of a Member-driven process for the work this year.  We look forward to discussions
focused on ideas and proposals generated by Members that relate to the reform objectives identified inArticle 20 and the preamble of the Agreement on Agriculture.  As different Members will have
different interests, and are at different stages in their preparation this year, we envision a range of
submissions from Members - from concept papers to proposals on specific issues to framework
proposals to comprehensive specific proposals.  While we have advanced discussions over the last
three years through the AIE process, the burden is clearly on Members to identify their interests and
provide compelling arguments for reform proposals.  For example, we have an interest in improving
market access conditions for products of new technologies and we understand other Members areG/AG/NG/W/7
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interested in more information on this topic.  At the same time, we recognize that more useful
analytical and technical work can be undertaken this year.  In particular, we envision useful
contributions from the WTO Secretariat on basic negotiating issues that are of interest to all Members.
We note that much of this work has been completed in the AIE process, and encourage the Secretariat
to update that work as required and undertake new studies that may be of use to the membership as weinitiate negotiations.  In sum, negotiations have begun and it is time to see proposals on the table even
as we continue our ongoing work identifying interests.
Timelines
We place particular importance on expeditious progress in the negotiations this year, and
deadlines will help focus attention and ensure we are not caught up in needless procedural wrangling.Making good progress this year is important to put us in a position to intensify negotiations next year.
Additionally, the faster we make progress in these negotiations, the sooner we will all benefit from
reform in agricultural policies.  Moreover, recogn izing certain built-in deadlines under the Agreement
on Agriculture and Members' own internal reform ef forts, deadlines will help us move forward on
much needed reform.  With this in mind, we support the idea of putting a deadline at the end of theyear for countries to submit a negotiating proposal, with recognition that countries may revisit or
make further elaborations on these proposals during the first quarter of next year, i.e., until
31 March 2001.  We would also be interested in setting deadlines further out next year for reaching
agreement on negotiating modalities and for tabling specific requests and offers, but recognize that
some Members may be hesitant to address that issue at this meeting.
Schedule of Meetings
We support the suggestion of back-to-back meetings  with the COA as a general rule, with the
Chair exercising his or her prerogative to call additional meetings, as needed.  This may include astock-taking session at the end of the year or early next year in order to advance our work toward the
March deadline.
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