PRESS RELEASE
PRESS/336
31 March 2003
(03-1829)
AGRICULTURE NEGOTIATIONS
Farm talks miss deadline; but ‘work must go on’, says Supachai
Director-General Supachai Panitchpakdi today ex pressed disappointment over the failure by WTO
member governments to agree on a framework for future agriculture trade reform but said
progress in the global trade negotiations can still be achieved provided governments continue to
work towards bridging their differences.
“The failure to meet the deadline for agreeing
agriculture negotiating modalities is a great
disappointment for us all.  Negotiators must redouble
their efforts in agriculture and all other areas of
negotiation between now and the September
Ministerial Conference in Cancun, Mexico. My initialdiscussions with ministers and other senior trade
officials, have given me some encouragement that this
commitment exists,” said the Director-General.
Dr. Supachai welcomed the willingness of participants
to continue working on agriculture modalities andstressed the importance of maintaining momentum in
other areas of the negotiations such as services,
industrial tariff reductions, trade and environment andreforming WTO rules, so that “positive linkages” with
the agriculture negotiations can be established.
“The Doha Development Agenda negotiations are a
single undertaking. No element of them will be agreed
until all areas are agreed. But significant progress insome areas often provides negotiators with an
incentive to overcome their differences even on the
most politically sensitive questions,” he said.
In the 31 March negotiations meeting, chairperson
Stuart Harbinson told delegations that the failure to
meet the deadline was “certainly a setback. We must all be disappointed that all our efforts have
not come to fruition,” he said.KEY DATES
Mar 2000     Negotiations start
(over 100 countries present proposals infirst year)
Nov 2001     4th WTO Ministerial
Conference in Doha, Qatar launches DohaDevelopment Agenda (DDA), addingagriculture and services
Dec 2002     Agriculture negotiations
chairman Stuart Harbinson compiles
“overview paper” (over 80 pages, com piling
all proposals)
17 Feb 2003     First draft “modalities”
circulated.24–28 February 2003: negotiations on firstdraft
18 Mar 2003     Revised first draft
“modalities” circulated.
25–31 March 2003: negotiations on revised
draft
31 Mar 2003     Deadline for “modalities”
Sep 2003     5th WTO Ministerial
Conference in Cancún, MexicoMembers submit draft commitments
1 Jan 2005     End of Doha Development
Agenda negotiationsPRESS/336
Page 2 of 2
He added: “I get a strong sense from all sides of a continuing commitment to the Doha mandate.
I have also been told by many delegates that they are committed to continue working on the
issues before us. We should not gloss over the difficulties, but we must also look to the future.”
He concluded: “The task ahead and our common responsibility is simple and clear — we must
continue working together towards completing the job given to us by ministers in Doha as soon as
possible.”
The 31 March deadline was for establishing “modalities” in the agriculture negotiations. These are
targets (including numerical targets) for achieving the objectives of the negotiations, as well asissues related to rules. They will set parameters for the final agreement in the agriculture
negotiations, for example how far import duties should be cut, and subsidies reduced or
eliminated, and over what periods of time.
Along with almost all the other negotiations under the Doha Development Agenda, the agriculture
talks are scheduled to end by 1 January 2005.
This timetable was agreed in November 2001, at the Fourth WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha,
Qatar.
The negotiations’ chairperson, Stuart Harbinson, prepared a first draft of the modalities in
February. Following comments from participants, this was revised in March, but Mr Harbinsonnoted that negotiators had tended to stick to their starting positions and had given him little
guidance on how to narrow the wide gaps between them.
Background and explanations on the WTO website
Agriculture negotiations:
http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negoti_e.htm
Explanation:
http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negs_bkgrnd00_contents_e.htm
The revised modalities draft:
http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/agric_e/negoti_mod2stdraft_e.htm
END