RESTRICTEDWORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONWT/GC/W/161
1 April 1999
(99-1333)
General Council Original:  English
PREPARATIONS FOR THE 1999 MINISTERIAL CONFERENCE
Agreement on Agriculture
Communication from Pakistan
The following communication, dated 26 March 1999, has been received from the Permanent
Mission of Pakistan.
_______________
1. The agriculture sector was brought into the fold of multilateral rules during the Uruguay
Round with an explicit objective of establishing a fair and market oriented system where free
movement of agricultural products across the border would be achieved.  The approach was to
introduce disciplines which would oblige Members to substantially and in a progressive manner
reduce agricultural support and protection, and to take into account the particular needs and conditions
of the developing countries by providing for a greater improvement of opportunities and terms of
access for agricultural products.
2. Empirical evidence demonstrates that the objectives set out have not been realized.  The
sector still remains highly protected in the developed economies mainly due to their lack of politicalwill to fulfil the commitments undertaken during the Uruguay Round (i.e. non implementation of the
obligations undertaken) and secondly because of the built in deficiencies in the provisions of the
Agreement.  For Pakistan, issues of implementation in the Agreement on Agriculture are of vital
importance.  We have emphasised this aspect in our previous submissions and we reiterate again that
implementation of the commitments must be a prerequi site to any future negotiations on this subject.
We have, therefore, divided our submission in two parts.  Part "A" deals with implementation issues
which need immediate action of the Membership and Part "B" comprises issues which may be
addressed in the mandated negotiations.
I. PART "A"
3. Tariffication through overvaluation of tariff equivalents, selective tariff reductions and tariff
escalations have been used as a trade restrictive measure by the developed countries to discourage
imports of agricultural products and diversification initiatives toward processed food.
4. This needs immediate redressal and rectification and rationalization in line with Members'
market access commitments undertaken in the Agreement on Agriculture.
5. The continuation of domestic support to domestic producers and the ability of the developed
countries to "re-balance" domestic support commitments on aggregate basis to undertake much lowerWT/GC/W/161
Page 2
reductions in most of the agricultural products of interest to developing countries has continued its
eroding effect on the competitiveness of other suppliers.
6. We believe that a collective long-term goal is to ensure that countries compete on a
commercial basis on quality, price and service rather than on government subsidized programmes.  It
would be unjustified to expect suppliers to compete with federal/local treasuries.  Substantialreductions in domestic support are, therefore, necessary as required under the Agreement.  Unless
these commitments are fulfilled the divide between the developing and the developed countries in the
agricultural sector will be further widened.
7. Discriminatory and non-transparent tariff rate quotas administration by allocation of MFN
tariff quotas to preferential suppliers, better access to state trading enterprises, limitations on imports
of particular products under broadly defined quota commitments and making imports under tariff
quotas conditional on absorption of domestic production of the product concerned besidesmaintenance of other non-tariff border measures are some of the other instances of non-compliance of
market access commitments by the developed countries.
8. The trade distortive effect of these instrument s is immense.  Unless there is a level playing
field developing countries will have little to gain from the Agreement.  A recent WTO study
substantiates this assertion.  The share of agricultural product exports originating from developingcountries has been at 4 1/2 % from 1990 to 1997.  There is urgent need for explicit guidelines or
minimum disciplines to ensure that these measures have the least trade distortive effect on developing
country exports.
9. The Ministerial Decision on measures concerning the possible negative effects of the reform
programme on LDCs and Net-Food Importing Developi ng Countries is a binding commitment since it
has also been incorporated in Article 16 of the Agreement.  The Decision commits developed
countries to provide assistance to the least developed countries and Net-Food Importing Developing
Countries in the following manner:
- Financial assistance to offset higher world prices and enable them to maintain normal imports
of goods.
- Adequate levels of food aid.- Financial and technical assistance to improve agricultural productivity and infrastructure.- Favourable treatment in relation to agricultural export credits.  It is unfortunate to note that
the Ministerial Decision has been completely ignored.
- Concrete operational measures and programmes must be initiated and incorporated in the
Ministerial Decision in order for it to be a reliable instrument which is both effective and
responsive to countries' needs.
10. Unless these prevailing imbalances in competition are rectified any further opening of
developing countries' markets will have substantial adverse affects on their welfare.  Therefore, these
issues need to be addressed and resolved before the new negotiations commence.
II. PART "B"
11. Pakistan shall promote the following objectives under the mandated negotiations:WT/GC/W/161
Page 3
- An assurance that the developed countries will refrain from "backsliding" towards higher and
selective agricultural and industrial protectionism.
- A meaningful reduction in the tariff ceilings by the developed countries by 2005 and
strengthening the market access provisions.
- Step increases in tariff rate quotas.- Immediate elimination of all kinds of domestic support, product specific subsidies and all
kinds of export subsidies by the developed countries.
- Elimination of special safeguard provisions (since these are often used as protectionist tools).- The developing and least developed countries, in view of their special needs and different
levels of development, require better S&D disciplines and more flexibility in the use of
domestic support to the agricultural sector.  The developing countries will look at mandated
negotiations as an opportunity to minimise flexibility in domestic support by developedcountries and providing more flexibility in this regard to developing and least developed
countries.  To this effect, an understanding should be reached that the restrictions available in
Article 3 of the Agreement on Agriculture will not apply to the developing countries and that
those developing countries which have already provided their schedules on reductions of
domestic support and export subsidies shall be allowed flexibility to enhance the levels ofthese measures and to lessen the pace of reduction of such levels within their national policies
to enable them to develop their agricultural sector and to ensure food security.  Therefore,
through a clarification or amendment of Arti cle 3 or 4 of the Agreement, the developing
countries should be excluded from the discipline of import control and domestic support in
the food product sector.
- Tariff escalation in developed countries may be rationalized so as to encourage diversification
in the processed food sector by developing countries. (At present, tariff escalation is being
used by some countries as a policy instrument to indirectly impede diversification and value
addition in agricultural products).
- Most of the net food-importing developing countries face balance of payments problems.  In
order to meet their rising import bills for food, the developed countries may take an initiative
by contributing towards a revolving fund to help ease this problem.  There should be a
provision in the Agreement elaborating upon the criteria for contribution and the enforcement
mechanism.
- The Agreement should envisage a technical assistance programme, whereby the developed
countries may help the developing countries in increasing their productivity, storage, grading
and packing facilities.
12. Unless such provisions are made in the Agreement and their implementation ensured through
an effective mechanism, the developing countries may feel further marginalised.  The developing
countries will be looking forward towards improved disciplines on agriculture and a well defined road
map for their effective implementation under the WTO.
__________