RESTRICTED  
  
TN/C/M/36  
 
4 June 2015  
(15-2939)  Page: 1/31  
Trade Negotiations Committee 
27 April 2015    
 
  MINUTES OF MEETING 
HELD IN THE CENTRE WILLIAM RAPPARD ON 27 APRIL 2015 
Chairperson: Mr. Roberto Azevêdo (Director-General) 
Contents 
 
1   REPORTS BY THE CHAIRPERSONS OF THE BODIES ESTABLISHED BY THE 
TRADE NEGOTIATIONS COMMITTEE (T NC) ...................................................................... 1  
2   STATEMENT BY THE CHAIRMAN .................................................................................. 6  
3   STATEMENTS BY  PARTICIPANTS ................................................................................. 8  
ANNEX - STATEMENT BY MALI ON BEHALF  OF THE COTTON FO UR (C-4) AT THE 
COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE IN SPECIA L SESSION ON 24  APRIL 2015 ...................... 31  
 
1  REPORTS BY THE CHAIRPERSONS OF THE BODIES ESTABLISHED BY THE TRADE NEGOTIATIONS COMMITTEE (TNC) 
1.1.  Ambassador John Adank (New Zealand), Chai rman of the Special Session of the Committee 
on Agriculture, said he had intensified his consultations on key aspects of the negotiations in 
agriculture. He had completed a cycle of consultations in various formats on key issues in all three 
pillars – domestic support, market access and export competition – as well as cotton and other 
issues. He had reported in detail on his consultations to an informal meeting of the Special Session 
the previous Friday. His report was being circulated . It was on the website and he did not intend to 
repeat it on this occasion, but would underline some points from it. 
1.2.  His overall assessment of the situation in the agriculture negotiations was a sombre one. 
Members were a long way from wh ere they should be given the July deadline. In key areas they 
were, as yet, far from convergence on certain threshold issues. This had in turn inhibited progress 
on other issues. The intensive process in which Members had engaged had still not seen 
delegations move from entrenched positions or able to find acceptable ways around them. Doing so was the urgent challenge ahead.  
1.3.  In domestic support, for example, it had become clear in the consultations that the nature 
and extent of disciplines on the  overall trade-distorting support (OTDS) was likely to be a key 
determinant of the possible outcomes across this pillar as a whole. Another key issue was the treatment of de minimis  support, where the question was the coverage and extent of any 
reductions in existing limits.  
1.4.  The situation in market access  was similar to domestic support. There was at least one major 
threshold issue that remained unresolved and that was impeding progress in other areas – the 
overall approach to be taken to tariff reductions. This was not in any way to minimise the 
importance of other outstanding issues, such as safeguards, which had also been covered by his consultations and where there was also little progress to report. 
1.5.   Export competition was on a surer footing in terms of the specific provisions from Hong Kong 
and Bali, but issues remained over the details and timing for implementation of results. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 2 - 
 
  1.6.  On cotton,  which Ministers had committed to addr ess ambitiously, expeditiously and 
specifically, there had been some useful exchanges and discussions, including on data. Following a suggestion by the Cotton Four (C-4), which had b een widely supported, he intended to pursue 
actively the discussions on cotton in the following months, in particular at a technical level, with a 
view to considering possible ways  forward in a focused manner.  
1.7.  Finally, although the issue of public stoc kholding for food security purposes was under a 
separate, dedicated track, in the interest of transparency he reported on his latest consultation on 
the issue. He had noted that despite more active engagement among delegations, Members had 
yet to move into focused work on solutions, although there had been a few indications of possible paths to explore further. He had repeated his advice: firstly, to keep in mind the collective mandate to find a permanent solution, and secondly , to move beyond the assertion of well-stated 
positions. He would pursue these consultations and convene another dedicated session at an 
appropriate time. 
1.8.  In conclusion, he said that there was an urgent need to move from repeating positions to 
working for solutions. There had been signs that a number of delegations were trying to do so, and 
he encouraged them – and everyone else – to continue. However there was no escaping the fact that any possible progress towards convergence was being seriously impeded by the standoff 
among some major players over the threshold issues that he had mentioned. They needed to find 
ways to bridge the gaps between them, and everyo ne needed to help as much as they could to 
enable this to happen.  
1.9.  He would go on working intensively with delegations, but he did not need to repeat at this 
stage the cycle of consultations just concluded. Instead, he would focus over the next few weeks 
on the key problem areas and the delegations most closely connected with them, while not losing sight of the bigger picture or the wider Membersh ip. He intended to convene another open-ended 
meeting in the second half of May and remained available for any delegation wishing to meet with 
him. 
1.10.  Ambassador Remigi Winzap (Switzerland), Chairman of the Negotiating Group on Market 
Access, recalled that the last time he had repo rted to Members was at the informal Heads of 
Delegation (HoDs) meeting convened by the Direct or-General on 18 March 2015. His report at that 
meeting had been distributed to Members in document JOB/MA/117. 
1.11.  Since his last non-agricultural market access (NAMA) specific meetings, which had taken 
place in an open-ended format on 2 March 2015 and in a Room D format on 17 March 2015, he 
had sensed continued engagement by Members. In  other words, he sensed that a more genuine 
effort was being made to explore avenues to move forward on NAMA. At the same time, he had 
also observed that there was difficulty for some  Members to conceive outcomes on NAMA in the 
absence of visible progress in agriculture. 
1.12.  Since the last informal HoDs meeting, he had met with a number of Members in different 
configurations to address specific issues which were of concern or interest to them. As an example, 
he had had a meeting on the issue of NAMA binding coverage with several so-called formula-applying Members with relatively low levels of binding coverage. He had also used the opportunity during his meetings to bring up the subject of non- tariff barriers (NTBs). At this point in time, he 
did not see much engagement by Members on NTBs. Furthermore, he had remained in close 
contact with the Director-General, as Chairman of the TNC, and with the other Chairs in order to fully anchor the NAMA work into the bigger effo rt which was being undertaken by all Members to 
deliver on the Doha Development Agenda (DDA). 
1.13.  He intended to continue the NAMA discussi ons in different configurations. The goal was to 
get into a situation that would allow Members to explore potential solutions. He encouraged 
Members to accelerate this exploratory phase and to start evaluating possible options. This would 
enable them to move in NAMA when the situation in agriculture evolved further. In this sense, he appreciated the fact that the Africa Caribbean  Pacific (ACP) Group had aired ideas in their 
document JOB/TNC/46 of 12 March 2015 on ACP elements for defining a post-Bali work program. 
A direction sketched in that document was to look for an approach in NAMA for the so-called 
formula-applying Members closer to the one which had been envisaged in Rev.3 (the Fourth Revision of Draft Modalities for Non-Agricultural Market Access contained in document TN/C/M/36 
 
- 3 - 
 
  TN/MA/W/103/Rev.3) for other Members, like for in stance small, vulnerable economies (SVEs). He 
remained open to all ideas and suggestions and would be happy to discuss with the Membership such ideas once they were in a more mature sh ape. He would convene an open-ended session in 
the following weeks where he intended to discuss with Members, in general terms, what they 
wished to see in the work program on NAMA.  
1.14.  Ambassador Gabriel Duque (Colombia), Chairm an of the Special Session of the Council for 
Trade in Services, said that he had started his consultations on the services element of a post-Bali 
work program early in the year in various configurations, so as to listen to ideas on how to 
proceed. Based on what he had heard during those meetings, he had circulated an informal note (RD/SERV/123, dated 17 February 2015) to update  all Members in a transparent manner on his 
consultations and to share the ideas that had transpired.  
1.15.  One idea that had attracted a degree of interest during these consultations had been to hold 
an open discussion on aspirations for the services  negotiations, so as to approximate what the 
services negotiations could be aiming at. The discussion had not been meant to address the 
question of how to proceed to realize such aspirations, so as to avoid the issue of linkages with 
other areas of the negotiations. 
1.16.  At an informal meeting on 24 February , there had been a large degree of support for 
holding an open discussion along those lines. Furt her to a request by Members at that meeting, 
the Secretariat organized a briefing session on GATS negotiations on 10 March, to review the different stages in the services market access and rules negotiations. The briefing had been well attended and, in his view, had been a very useful  refresher that should help all Members in the 
development of the services elem ent of the post-Bali agreement. 
1.17.  During the following informal meeting on 26 March, Members had agreed to hold an open 
discussion on the elements for a services compon ent of the post-Bali work program, allowing 
delegations to freely express their views. It was agreed that the output of the discussion should be 
a Chairman's summary that was factual, non-binding, non-attributable and neutral. The summary should also avoid qualifications and conclusions and not prejudge any next steps.  
1.18.  The open-ended discussion took place on  20 April 2015 at an informal meeting of the 
Special Session. Members had recognized the need for realism and doability, and to calibrate results with other areas of the negotiations, in particular with agriculture and NAMA. Many delegations had mentioned that the market access negotiations should reduce water in the 
commitments. Some had also referred to the importance of securing broad participation. Several 
delegations had highlighted sectors and modes of particular interest to them. The centrality of a pro-development outcome that delivered liberalization on sectors and modes of interest of 
developing and least-developed countries, while at  the same time providing flexibility for them, 
had been emphasized by a large number of delegati ons. The importance in particular of mode 4 
commitments on contractual and independent service suppliers had been mentioned repeatedly. 
The need for building into the work program a high level of transparency on the outcome in 
market access had also been mentioned. Some de legations had suggested that this transparency 
could begin with an exchange of lists of what Members needed and what they could contribute. 
A number of delegations had underscored the importance of allowing for the necessary lead time 
to prepare revised offers.  
1.19.  On the rules aspects of the services negotiations, a difference in assessment between 
domestic regulation and GATS rules had been evid ent. Most Members saw domestic regulation as 
forming part of the outcome from the post-Bali wo rk program, whereas only a few delegations had 
advocated an outcome on emergency safeguards. No delegation had considered an outcome on government procurement and subsidies to be re alistic. On domestic regulation, there had 
appeared to be broad agreement that the focus of  work should be on those issues that enjoyed 
wide support and on which convergence was realistic and doable, particularly in the areas of transparency and procedural rules.  
1.20.  Some delegations had questioned the need at this point of advancing discussions on the 
work program, given the absence of progress in  other DDA areas, especially agriculture. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 4 - 
 
  1.21.  He said that he would circulate his Chairman's summary in the course of the day. He had 
also called for a further meeting on 7 May to cont inue to discuss the services elements of the post-
Bali work program, including the next steps. 
1.22.  In the absence of Ambassador Tan Yee Wo an (Singapore), Chairperson of the Special 
Session of the Committee on Trade and Developmen t, Deputy Director-General Yonov Frederick 
Agah read out her report, as follows: 
"Members will recall that in February 2015, the proponents had tabled two lists of 
special and differential treatment (S&D) provisions which they would like to pursue in 
the Special Session. The African Group and ACP jointly tabled a list of 14 S&D provisions whilst the LDC Group tabled a list of 25 S&D provisions (the LDC 
Submission was later circulated to Members as JOB/DEV/28). It is my understanding 
that these two lists could potentially be the universe of S&D provisions that the 
Special Session will need to consider as we finalise the post-Bali work program. However, so far these are only lists of pr ovisions in different WTO Agreements that 
the proponents have expressed interest in pursuing in the Special Session. Clearly, 
these are not yet in the form of specific textual proposals that can be discussed in the Special Session.  
Since taking over the chairpersonship of the Special Session in March this year, 
I have been in contact with the proponents, namely, the coordinators of the LDC, African and ACP Groups and their respective focal points on development. I understand, from these consultations, that the proponents are still in the process of 
finalising textual proposals on the S&D provisions identified in the two lists which 
have been tabled. During my consultation s with the proponents, I have underscored 
that meaningful work in the Special Session can only begin after these textual 
proposals have been tabled.  
We have very little time until the end of July and it is, therefore, important that the 
proponents present their textual proposals as soon as possible, so that substantive 
work in the Special Session can start." 
1.23.  Ambassador Dacio Castillo (Honduras), Chairman of the Special Session of the Council for 
TRIPS, recalled that since the General Council Deci sion of 27 November 2014 to resume work on 
the post-Bali agenda, the Special Session of the Council for TRIPS had held informal open-ended 
meetings on 12 December 2014 and on 23 Februa ry 2015. The purpose of these meetings had 
been for Members to share any new ideas on how progress could be made in the work of the TRIPS Special Session and on how it should be reflected in the "clearly defined work program on 
the remaining DDA issues" mandated by Ministers at the Bali Ministerial meeting.  
1.24.  While there was no indication of a substantive shift of traditional positions, Members had 
agreed at the meeting in December to hold an informal information session on the activities of the 
negotiating group, in order to update delegations on the work undertaken in the TRIPS Special 
Session up to 2011. After further consultations with Members in early 2015, the Council had held such an informal information session on 23 Febr uary 2015 in which the Secretariat had provided a 
detailed factual overview of past work in the TRIPS Special Session, tracing the negotiations of a 
register for geographical indications (GIs) for wine and spirits from 1997 to 2011. This information 
sharing session had been appreciated by Members as  comprehensive and useful – in particular for 
delegations that had not recently been involved in the negotiations – for illuminating the amount 
of work that had already been accomplished in the course of these negotiations.  
1.25.  It was his impression that, while some Me mbers continued to highlight the importance of 
this issue for them substantively, engagement in the TRIPS Special Session had not improved so 
far. The traditional differences on the substance and scope of the negotiations persisted, and 
delegations remained hesitant to fully engage in the TRIPS Special Session for lack of clarity on the overall negotiations picture after Bali. Nevert heless, the in-depth background provided by the 
informal information session had prepared Members to return to more substantive discussions 
once the overall atmosphere for re-engagement had become more favourable. In the meantime, 
he would be reaching out to delegations again to explore further avenues for progress over the following weeks. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 5 - 
 
  1.26.  Ambassador Wayne McCook (Jamaica), Chairm an of the Negotiating Group on Rules, said 
that as foreshadowed at the previous TNC meeting, he had held extensive bilateral consultations in 
late March, meeting with 16 separate delegations and several groups. His objectives had been two-fold: to hear directly from delegations their views regarding the role they believed Rules 
should play in the post-Bali work program; and to hear their ideas regarding the process to be 
followed to ensure that the Membership could coll ectively arrive at a conclusion regarding that 
role. 
1.27.  With regard to process, and as confirme d in open-ended consultations of the Negotiating 
Group on 14 April, there would be two Rules-rela ted activities on 4 May. In the morning, there 
would be an information session conducted by the Secretariat, which would provide delegations with factual background about the state of play in the Rules negotiations. In the afternoon, there 
would be an open-ended discussion in the Negotiating Group itself, at which delegations were 
invited to express their views about the role that Rules could play in the post-Bali work program. 
He realized that there remained varied views about how and when Members could most 
productively engage on Rules, and he appreciated delegations' willingness to compromise so that 
the discussion of how Rules issues might move forward could begin.  
1.28.  He did not intend to report on the substantive positions that delegations were beginning to 
develop regarding the role of Rules in the work prog ram, as he preferred that delegations talked to 
each other in the 4 May discussions convoked for that purpose. There were positive signs that 
delegations were beginning to become more concrete about their objectives, including in written submissions. He hoped that the 4 May discussions would help delegations to better understand 
each other's positions and to prepare the ground for further constructive engagement. 
1.29.  In the absence of Ambassador Wiboonlasana Ruamraksa (Thailand), Chairperson of the 
Special Session of the Committee on Trade and Environment, Deputy Director-General David 
Shark read out her report, as follows: 
"The Special Session of the Committee on Trade and Environment (CTE SS) held an 
informal information session on 13 March, following the request made by 
delegations. At this session, the Secretariat provided a detailed overview of the 
discussions that have taken place so far in the CTE SS on all three items of paragraph 31 of the DDA. This informative session was a good opportunity for delegations to refresh their memory and gain a better understanding of the state of 
play. Following the Secretariat's presenta tion, several delegations expressed their 
openness for further discussions in the CTE SS, noting that delegations should engage with a fresh look, open mindedness and realism going forward. Some other 
delegations indicated that further clarity on the core issues of DDA negotiations was 
necessary before taking additional steps in the CTE SS.  
I would like to reiterate my call for delegations to intensify their reflections on what 
should be part of the post-Bali work prog ram and what contribution the group could 
make to the Tenth Ministerial Conference (MC10), keeping in mind the Director-General's criteria of doability. I have invited interested delegations to informal bilateral consultations, to which some dele gations have already responded positively. 
The objective is to hear from delegations their concrete ideas on  how the CTE SS 
should contribute to the post-Bali work pr ogram, what possible elements should be 
included in the work program, and how to move the work of the CTE SS forward. 
I have started to meet with delegations last week and invite any other interested 
delegation to contact me." 
1.30.  Ambassador Ronald Saborío Soto, Chairman of the Special Session of the Dispute 
Settlement Body, said that over a period of two weeks in March, he had held a round of 
substantive consultations bilaterally with several Members, including those who had expressed 
interest in consulting with him on the work of these negotiations. During the week of 13 April, he had convened a series of small-group meetings in various configurations on select areas of the 
negotiations. These meetings had addressed some of the points of continuing divergence among 
participants and had allowed candid exchanges on Members' principal concerns and potential flexibilities. He believed that this had been very valuable and had helped to better assess what 
might be achievable. He had provided a debrie fing of his assessment to a larger group of 
participants, which would be circulated to all Members as document JOB/DS/18. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 6 - 
 
  1.31.  In his view, the work that had been do ne since the end of the horizontal process had 
demonstrated participants' continued commitment to working constructively towards an achievable, balanced outcome. Much work still remained to be done to confirm what was doable; but he believed that important improvements and clarifications to the Dispute Settlement 
Understanding (DSU) were within reach. He had encouraged participants to explore all of the 
issues on the table in parallel, so as to have a se nse of what the overall picture could look like and 
how the pieces of the puzzle could fit together fo r an outcome. He intended to convene further 
meetings in the following weeks to build on the progress achieved. He remained available to meet 
with any delegation. 
1.32.  The Trade Negotiations Committee took note of the reports by the Chairpersons of the 
bodies established by it. 
2  STATEMENT BY THE CHAIRMAN 
2.1.  The Chairman recalled that in his report to the General Council in February, he had said that 
negotiating work had intensified and that the aim had been to have a deeper political discussion in 
a more interactive format, through a number of parallel but complementary tracks. He thought 
that Members had made a good start in that effort and had made good use of the momentum that they had coming into 2015. He had been consulti ng with and listening to Members. There had 
been Room W meetings. The Chairs had been doing a good job in running their respective cycles 
of consultations. He had met with all of the Chairs in recent days, and thanked them for their work. He said that sometimes the Chairs were conf ronted by big gaps between positions, but they 
had not been discouraged. They continued to push  Members to engage. They continued to provoke 
new conversations and to urge Members to explore new ideas. He was very grateful for their 
efforts.  
2.2.  He drew three essential conclusions from th e Chairs' reports and from his own consultations. 
First, a lot of good work had been done, particular ly in the three core areas of agriculture, NAMA 
and services. In his view, it was clear that achiev ing outcomes in these areas would be essential to 
the success of the negotiations. He noted that Members needed to make sure they were advancing 
work in all areas, trying to avoid any kind of de facto  sequencing. At the same time, there were 
gateway issues that Members needed to focus on. The reality was that these were predominantly in the agriculture and NAMA pillars. In all this, Members also needed to ensure that services was 
not left behind. 
2.3.  His second conclusion was that it remained clear that development and least-developed 
country (LDC) issues remained central and that work had to continue to move these issues forward. The Global Review of Aid for Trade in J une would provide an important additional focus to 
the development component. He would remain closely engaged with broader efforts such as the 
UN's work on Financing for Development and discussions on the post-2015 development agenda. 
2.4.  His third conclusion was that while it was clear that there was still a long way to go and that 
some areas were proving very problematic, progress was being made. There was a great amount 
of engagement on the core DDA issues. It was en couraging that participation had been at a high 
level. Ambassadors were getting involved. This suggested that Members were invested in the process, had been doing their homework and had b een engaging capitals. This was a positive sign. 
The engagement had also been constructive.  
2.5.  Members had moved from a finger-pointing mo de to a solution-finding mode. This was where 
they needed to be. He did not believe that anyone had expected it to be easy. The solution-finding 
mode was proving to be tough. He said that Members should not expect it to lead to immediate 
convergence, or to produce instant results.  
2.6.  As reported by the Chairs, Members were still at odds on some major issues, and some big 
gaps remained. Some Members were still repeating their old positions, or taking more time to 
move to a solution-finding approach. This was to  be expected, and he urged Members not to be 
discouraged. This had been part of every negotiatio n. Members had to look at some of these signs, 
which could be perceived as negative, in the right context. The fact that Members were at odds on 
some issues now did not mean they were not willing to talk and move forward.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 7 - 
 
  2.7.  Similarly, there was some nervousness abou t exploring new ideas because it seemed as if 
this required moving away from positions of comf ort. He said that exploring options did not mean 
giving up positions or fully committing to the ideas being tabled. However, sticking to old and comfortable positions would prevent Members fr om moving forward. Whatever outcome was 
achieved would be uncomfortable for everyone.  
2.8.  Members had been through many cycles of negotiations. Some would say that no progress 
was being made, or that this work was not going to  lead anywhere. He disagreed. He said that it 
would be surprising if, at this point in time, there were already solutions to the problems that 
Members had been grappling with for so long. Many had voiced similar doubts in the lead-up to Bali. It had looked very difficult at times. But, in the end, they had been proved wrong. He said 
that as with Bali, if the political will were there, Members would deliver.  
2.9.  He said there were reasons to be upbeat. While some Members were still taking a cautious 
approach, others were being more proactive. Some were putting forward fresh thinking, making proposals and putting forward papers. Moreover, Members were discussing these proposals. This 
was positive. The situation was very different fr om what Members had experienced before. In the 
past, discussions had been limited to entrenched positions, with nothing new on the table. Now 
there were ideas and proposals to discuss. This was progress. In several areas, there might be 
potential outcomes which were largely acceptable to everyone. The question was whether overall 
balance could be found in a way that everyone could live with. 
2.10.  There was another level of negotiations which had not yet been fully explored – the 
horizontal discussion to identify inter-sectoral trade-offs. More focus was needed on identifying the 
trade-offs within pillars and between them. By definition, the Chairs' work could not explore some 
of these trade-offs. They worked strictly within th eir respective jurisdictions. But it was their work 
that made trade-offs possible because they identified the potential options. This underlined why 
avoiding sequencing the work was important. Memb ers had to keep moving forward in all of the 
different groups, so that they could explore how they might interact. These trade-offs were not clearly on the table yet. Once Members began to take a more careful look at them, things might 
change quite considerably.  
2.11.  In the following weeks, the Chairs would continue their work. He would also increasingly 
look at ways to facilitate discussion on those horizontal trade-offs. His ongoing discussions with delegations were useful in this context. Some times in these discussions he had heard elements 
which did not feature in the bigger meetings. The overall positions expressed were the same, but 
he often heard the reasons behind positions, or additional elements which shed light on new avenues which could provide a way forward. This horizontal process, which would be taken up in 
the wider Room W meetings in due course, would be vital in fulfilling the mandate.  
2.12.  The instructions remained clear. Members were working to conclude a clearly defined work 
program on the remaining DDA issues by July 2015.  He had been saying from the beginning that 
the best outcome would be a work program that was specific and modalities-like, and which 
therefore allowed Members to finalize negotiations quickly after it had been agreed. July was getting closer. Members, therefore, had to be realistic about how specific and modalities-like the work program could be. Only Members could an swer this question. The earlier they found 
conceptual solutions for the big, tough issues, th e better the end product they would be able to 
deliver.  
2.13.  He said that whatever the nature of the work program that would be achieved by July, it 
would have to fulfil certain criteria. First, it would have to be substantive and meaningful; second, 
it had to give guidance on how to conclude the negotiations; and third, it had to be a springboard towards a successful MC10 in Nairobi in December. What Members did now would dictate what 
would be possible in Nairobi. Therefore, he urged Members to keep this in mind in the current 
discussions.  
2.14.  There were three months before the July deadline. He said this was enough time to advance 
and deliver a substantive outcome. But that time ha d to be used to the fullest. Efforts would need 
to increase in all of the negotiating formats. Ca pitals would need to engage to an even greater 
degree, as Members were approaching the stage where political calls would need to be made. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 8 - 
 
  2.15.  The Chairs' processes would continue. He would be increasing the intensity of his own 
consultations. The principles of transparency an d inclusiveness which had served the Membership 
well on the road to Bali would continue to  be a hallmark of work moving forward.  
2.16.  There was a long way to go. But progress was being made. New ideas were being tested. 
After many years of deadlock, Members were genuinely breaking new ground. There were a 
number of possibilities and avenues available to Members. But Members had to explore them. This 
was not going to happen by itself. Members had to be creative. He believed that they were 
beginning to be creative. He stressed that testing new ideas did not commit Members to those 
ideas. The focus had to remain on what was doable. Members had to be prepared to leave their comfort zones. All of them would have to contribute. 
2.17.  The Trade Negotiations Committee took note of the Chairman's statement. 
3  STATEMENTS BY PARTICIPANTS 3.1.  All delegations that spoke expressed sy mpathy and condolence to the Government and 
people of Nepal for the devastating earthquake th at had hit the country. They also welcomed the 
Seychelles as the 161
st WTO Member. 
3.2.  The representative of Lesotho, on behalf  of the African Group, noted that Members were 
faced with an uphill task and that a lot of courage and political will was needed to move the 
agenda forward. In light of the briefings on consultations held to date, two points were worth 
underscoring. Firstly, substantial differences, pr imarily among Members with greatest share of 
international trade, remained. This was not a surprise in the light of previous experiences. Secondly, novel ideas on how to move the agenda  forward had been made. Request-offer, offer-
request, average cuts, simplified approach, mixt ure of request-offer and average cuts, cutting 
water, new approaches to disciplining domestic support under agriculture, recalibration of the level of ambition, matching of contributions and similar concepts had emerged since Members had 
embarked on a process to develop the work prog ram as per the Bali outcome. Moreover, the form 
in respect of the level of details the work program was expected to take had also been characterized, and the expectation had been that it would mirror modalities with regard to the 
depth of its content. 
3.3.  All the elements that had emerged from the consultations had kept Members engaged with 
anticipation for a breakthrough. The African Group remained hopeful that a workable solution could 
be found. Nonetheless, in figuring out solutions to move consultations forward, it was worth 
recalling the message that the Group had consistently conveyed to Members. All the novel ideas 
on how to move the agenda forward, proposed negotiating approaches, the nature of the work 
program and its content, and similar efforts to make a breakthrough had to conform to the Doha 
Ministerial Declaration and attendant mandates. The DDA negotiations had to pass the litmus test 
prescribed in these mandates. 
3.4.  Agriculture was an important pillar for African countries and an outcome in this area was of 
critical importance. The tug of war between Member s' retroactive and prospective perspectives on 
what should constitute a fair DDA outcome in agriculture had been evident in the consultations. Nevertheless, the fact that negotiations on agriculture could not be divorced both from the outcome of the Uruguay Round negotiations and the DDA mandate on agriculture negotiations 
presupposed the necessity for retroactive consideration of the Agreement on Agriculture, 
commonly known as the "reform agenda". It was clear that the Agreement on Agriculture was not sacred. In this context, it was hard to foresee the African Group supporting any approach running 
short of levelling the playing field and eliminatin g and/or significantly reducing trade-distorting 
subsidies. African countries' investments in agriculture had been sinking because these legitimate investments could not compete with distorting subsidies derived from the current Agreement on 
Agriculture regime. Any additional subsidies would not remedy the situation. Members needed to 
take cognizance of the fact that delays in reforms in agriculture would only bring the system to irrelevance. If given a choice between whether to observe the multilateral rules or take public policy responsibility by meeting the needs of the hungry multitudes, the answer was obvious. 
From the African Group's perspective, Members could no longer afford the luxury of turning a blind 
eye to the fact that the current architecture of the Agreement on Agriculture could not be 
sustainable in the 21
st century.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 9 - 
 
  3.5.  In other areas, such as NAMA, where fo r African formula-applying countries the Swiss 
formula could not be tenable, and services, where there was a need to have an outcome within sectors of interest to African countries, the views expressed by the Group remained valid to date. 
3.6.  The immediate task was to develop a well -defined work program in no less than three 
months. In this context, the African Group was of a strong view that first, the work program 
should be comprehensive and cover all remaining DDA issues as per the Ninth Ministerial Conference (MC9) mandate. It also had to respect the existing mandates for the negotiations 
including negotiating principles enshrined therein.  The current consultations on the work program 
were not a renegotiation of existing and agre ed mandates. Second, the development dimension 
had to cut across every subject matter under negotiation in a way that proved practical and economically meaningful. Third, every novel idea had to be tested against the existing mandates 
and no effort should be spared in ensuring that the process, approaches, the substance and 
principles of negotiations were adhered to, to the fullest extent. Lastly, the flexibilities of the African countries, in all their categories, had to be fully preserved. This was a golden standard 
against which every new idea should be subjected to. 
3.7.  The representative of Barbados, on behalf of the ACP Group, supported the statement by the 
LDC Group. The ACP had reiterated its intent to be constructive in fulfilling the mandate for the 
development of the post-Bali work program. This was part of the rationale behind the submission 
of the ACP Elements Paper, which represented the Group's effort to begin the inclusion of concrete elements in the work program. The Group welcom ed this opportunity to introduce, under the 
umbrella of the TNC, JOB/TNC/46, which had been submitted on 12 March 2015.  
3.8.  The Elements Paper was submitted as a contribution to stimulate thinking on a modalities-
type work program from the perspective of the in terests of the ACP Group as a floor upon which 
other Members could build, as they began to untangle stumbling blocks in the DDA negotiations. 
While some sections of the paper had been intr oduced in various open-ended meetings of the 
negotiating groups, she stressed that the submission  should be read and interpreted as a whole. 
No one section or sub-section should stand alone. The ACP paper addressed the areas of 
importance to the Group in concluding the DDA, recognising that the work program had to be 
comprehensive and include all remaining DDA areas. In addition, the submission indicated that, as ideas from major players developed and gained trac tion, the Group might revise its submission or 
come forward with other submissions. In the pa per, the ACP Group had signalled openness to any 
ideas that allowed Members to overcome the most critical and fundamental stumbling blocks in the 
negotiations. However these ideas had to critically respect the principle that the ACP flexibilities and differential treatment under the various pillars would not be undermined.  
3.9.  With only three months left to complete the mandated clearly defined work program, it was 
imperative that Members moved to specifics and began to clearly detail not only the contours, but the specifics of the work program. The ACP Grou p called upon those in a position to provide 
leadership in key areas to do so. The members of the Group would also seek to do their part, 
bearing in mind that: first, development had to remain at the centre of discussions. In this regard, special and differential (S&D) treatment had to be an integral part of the various pillars. These were integral elements, not negotiating points to be traded and measured against overall balance. 
Second, Members needed clarification on what was meant by recalibration. The Group expected 
that calls for recalibration did not entail undermining the development dimension of the Round and the S&D treatment and flexibilities of ACP States. Similarly, such calls were not synonymous with 
requesting greater contributions or more market access from ACP States. 
3.10.  Third, the mandate required a clearly defined work program on all  remaining DDA elements. 
Efforts had to be intensified in all the areas, not only the three main elements of agriculture, NAMA 
and services, but development, LDC issues and other areas as well. Fourth, the Membership had to 
deliver a clearly defined work program by 31 July 2015 and have concrete, tangible deliverables ahead of MC10 in Nairobi, as Members sought not only the development of the work program, but 
the conclusion of the Doha Development Round. 
3.11.  The representative of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, on behalf of the Arab Group, said that 
Members were at a critical juncture in the work towards reaching a clear post-Bali work program. 
Time was not on their side. There were only three months to finalize the work program within the 
agreed deadline. There was an urgent need for all Members to engage constructively and work on TN/C/M/36 
 
- 10 - 
 
  a solution-finding mode in developing this work program to conclude the Doha Development 
Round.  
3.12.  The post-Bali work program was very import ant to maintain the credibility of the WTO and 
the multilateral trading system. The Arab Group fi rmly believed that the development dimension of 
the DDA should remain the overarching principle of the work program. The work program should 
balance the interests of all WTO Members. This meant that it should be designed in such a way that it took into account all elements of the negotiations with equal priority, keeping developing 
and least-developed countries' special needs and interests at the forefront. It should also take into 
account the special situation of Recently-Acceded Members (RAMs), who had joined the WTO in accordance with Article XII of the Marrakesh Agreement and had undertaken extensive market 
access commitments at the time of their accessions. In this context, Members should build on the 
work undertaken in the last decade and ensure  that the negotiated outcome was balanced.  
3.13.  The Arab Group maintained its continued su pport for the multilateral trading system and the 
successful conclusion of the DDA. The Group confirmed its commitment towards the 
implementation of the Bali decisions and called on Members to work together to finalize the post-
Bali work program by July 2015. The Arab Group remained ready to engage constructively in the work ahead. 
3.14.  Speaking on behalf of the Group of Recently Acceded Members (RAMs), he recalled that this 
was the group of Members who had joined the WTO in accordance with Article XII of the 
Marrakesh Agreement. The RAMs appreciated the Chairman's and the negotiating group Chairs' 
recent efforts in conducting consultations, and were grateful to those Members who had made new 
proposals. All these efforts were aimed at successf ully completing the post-Bali work program by 
July. However, it seemed that progress was still slow, with no breakthrough in sight yet. 
3.15.  Members agreed that the work program should be realistic and doable. If the level of 
ambition needed to be recalibrated, it should be realistic and affordable for everyone. But, realistic 
did not mean no ambition at all. Even if the level of ambition was low, as long as concessions were made, the RAMs would still be making real co ntributions to the Organization once again. 
3.16.  The RAMs had made exceptionally deep commitments in the course of their accession 
processes. These extensive and deep commitments  had been highlighted by the RAMs Group on 
numerous occasions over the years, and various references could be found in several documents released recently by the Secretariat. Even more important was the fact that the accession 
commitments already made by all of the RAMs were very close to their current regimes. There was 
no water left for the RAMs. These exceptionally deep commitments and the terms under which the RAMs joined the WTO made them different from  the original Members of the Organization. 
The Group believed it was reasonable for the RAMs – most of whom were developing, least-
developed or SVE Members – to be entitled to mo re and better flexibilities. They also hoped that 
after the conclusion of the DDA, the commitment levels between the original Members and the 
RAMs would be as closely matched as possible. It was only through the collective contributions of 
all WTO Members that the DDA could be successfully concluded.  
3.17.  There were only three months until July . For a successful Nairobi Ministerial meeting, 
Members needed to move up a gear in their effo rts to complete the work program by the July 
deadline. The RAMs Group called for more intensified efforts in the next few weeks focusing on the 
elements contained in the work program. They hoped that Members would make full use of all possible resources, working with capitals to redoub le efforts to work together. Only by doing so, 
could they complete the work programme by July and have any chance of securing a fruitful 
outcome at the Nairobi Ministerial Conference.  
3.18.  The representative of Indonesia, on behalf  of the G-33, reiterated the importance the Group 
attached to its proposals on Special Products (SP), Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) and Public 
Stockholding for Food Security Purposes. These pr oposals were crucial, not only for addressing 
development needs, such as food security, liveliho od security and rural development, but also for 
continuing the reform process to rectify the imbalances of the Uruguay Round outcomes.  
3.19.  The G-33 had undertaken a series of informal  dialogues to have frank exchanges with other 
groups and individual Members to discuss key aspe cts of its proposals. The Group had been active TN/C/M/36 
 
- 11 - 
 
  in Chair-led meetings and consultations, and ex pressed appreciation to some Members that had 
contributed to the deliberations by addressing the technical aspects of the proposals while encouraging similar engagements from other Members. Nevertheless, the Group regretted that during the consultations, some Members had questioned the mandates and the legitimate grounds 
of the Group's proposals which concerned hundred s of millions of small, subsistence farmers 
across developing countries that the Group represented.  
3.20.  With regard to the overall discussions in the agriculture negotiations, the G-33 re-
emphasized the importance of preserving the ha rd-won gains under the draft Rev.4 text (the 
Revised Draft Modalities for Agriculture contained in document TN/AG/W/4/Rev.4). The Group was fully aware that the text was not cast in stone. The Group said that Members who had difficulties should come forward and spell them out. They were willing to engage constructively without 
diluting the development mandate of the Round and the S&D principle which had to be at the 
centre of any outcome. In conclusion, the G-33 reiterated its commitment to engaging constructively to advance its proposals on SP, SSM and finding a permanent solution to the issue 
of Public Stockholding for Food Security Purposes. 
3.21.  The representative of Brazil, on behalf of the G-20, said that agriculture had lagged behind 
for many decades in the multilateral trading system, in terms of remaining barriers and distortions 
to trade as well as the absence of stronger disciplines that might begin to balance the playing field. 
It was, therefore, high time to correct the imbalances inherited from the past and concentrate efforts with an aim to deliver concrete results, especially for the developing world. The preparation of a clearly defined work program on the remaining DDA issues offered a unique opportunity.  
3.22.  The G-20 reiterated that concrete outcomes  in agriculture would set the level of ambition 
for the negotiations. A balanced and developmen t-oriented work program in agriculture would 
have to include results in the three pillars of  market access, domestic support and export 
competition. The 2008 revised draft modalities for Agriculture contained in document 
TN/AG/W/4/Rev.4 remained the basis for discussions. The G-20 reiterated its commitment to advance the agricultural negotiations in accordance with the Doha mandate including as embodied 
in subsequent Ministerial Decisions and with full respect to the principles of S&D and less than full 
reciprocity (LTFR) for developing countries. 
3.23.  He said that Members were facing a defining moment. There was no time to waste and all 
Members had to live up to their responsibilities. Agriculture held the key that might allow for 
progress in the other core areas of the DDA. Me mbers had to act now and deliver on the mandate 
agreed in Doha and reinforced in successive ministerial conferences.  
3.24.  Speaking on behalf of Brazil, he said that  his delegation had been actively involved in the 
consultations and meetings held over the previous  weeks and had been pleased to confirm that the 
debate had been brought to a level of detail and, sometimes, intensity that had not been seen in 2014.  
3.25.  He said that, as the Chairman had stated, Members always knew it would not be easy. 
There were various complex circles that they needed to square or shape into even more creative, workable forms. What Members ne eded to avoid was the repetition  of arguments centred on why 
they could not do one thing or another, why on e would not do something because it knew that 
others would not do something else. He said that such discourse only served to support the 
questionable conclusion that what could actually been achieved would have to be in the realm of close to nothing. He said Members had to be clear – they would never be able to declare "Mission 
Accomplished" on the basis of the mountain giving birth to a mouse.  
3.26.   His delegation had heard concerns that people outside might be close to writing off the 
WTO as a rule-making instance because of the time that had passed since the launch of the Doha 
Round. Those concerns might be justified. He argued, nonetheless, that such a write-off would 
happen if Members were to make a U-turn and head towards outcomes so modest that any attempt to present them as relevant to their societies would have to breach the limits of intellectual and political modesty.  
3.27.  All Members knew that they were engaged in an exercise that would most probably involve 
adjustments in the level of ambition. Such adjust ments would have to be balanced, while taking TN/C/M/36 
 
- 12 - 
 
  into consideration the fact that Members were dealing with a playing field that was far from 
horizontal. As he had said before, there was a floor of ambition below which the entire exercise would stop making sense. It was imperative that Members preserved the essence of the mandate and promises of the Doha Development Round. This was why, as many others, Brazil had insisted 
from the outset, that agriculture be at the centre of the deliberations and that Members needed to 
make progress in all three pillars of market access, domestic support and export competition. He said that there was no detachment from reality on the part of those Members – as the African 
Group – who sustained the demand, despite all apparent difficulties of convergence; difficulties 
that his delegation had recognized and, in many cases, viewed as legitimate. On the contrary, it 
was only realistic to accept that after all the passes agriculture had been forced to take in previous cycles of negotiation, it would now have to be part of the end-game.  
3.28.  He said that all Members were responsible for making progress, and Brazil would live up to 
its role and responsibilities in this important effort. It would not give up. It would continue to refuse premature pessimism. It would remain realistically determined to work pragmatically with 
other Members to achieve significant and balanced results, especially in the core areas of the 
agenda. Those results would have to deliver on the Doha mandate with development at its centre and begin to concretely reform agricultural trade, so as to effectively strengthen the multilateral 
trading system. 
3.29.  The representative of Switzerland, on be half of the G-10, said the Group attached the 
highest importance to the multilateral trading system and remained strongly committed to 
concluding the DDA. The Group appreciated the engagement shown by Members in the Special 
Session of the Committee on Agriculture (CoA SS) consultations, but also noted that the clock was 
ticking fast. In particular, the Group wished to stress the importance of movement in the domestic support pillar, which at present held back progress in all other areas. Under this pillar, it remained 
important for the Group that room for manoeuver was ensured in domestic policy design and 
recognition of the different roles of agriculture in society. At the same time, this should not hinder Members from addressing the most trade-distorting elements of domestic support. 
3.30.  With regard to market access, even though the Group was the most exposed, it was ready 
to engage positively in substantive discussions to find doable solutions. Therefore, it welcomed contributions to advance the negotiations. The Group was open to discussing alternative tariff reduction formulas provided they ensured the necessary flexibilities for the Group. The Group 
remained strongly opposed to tariff capping.  
3.31.  Regarding export competition, it recognized that the Rev.4 modalities were widely accepted 
for new export competition rules. However, it was not realistic to expect at MC10 results in this 
pillar only. Additionally, it wished to underline that  export restrictions continued to be of concern to 
the Group. It welcomed the consultations by the CoA SS Chair on this issue and encouraged further discussions among Members on this subject.  
3 .3 2 .  Sp e aking  on  b e half of  S witze r land , h e  s aid  that c onve ntiona l wis d om s a id  that what was 
needed for brokering a deal was Members with offensive interests at the negotiation table. 
He asked what the situation was in the DDA, today.  On the offensive side, it seemed that most 
Members wanted results on all three agriculture p illars. For several Members this would, however, 
be very difficult because they had defensive interests on agriculture and for these Members – 
Switzerland being one – an outcome on agriculture would only be possible if there were commensurate commitments taken in NAMA and services. In these areas, other Members had 
more defensive than offensive interests. His take  was that currently, overall, there were more 
defensive than offensive interests in this negotiation. This made Members' endeavour difficult. However, he asked whether the endeavour was impossible. 
3.33.  He said that he would not throw in the towel. His impression was that most Members were 
seeking a more level playing field for their econom ies. Many Members wanted to address, at least 
to a certain extent, the big differences among present WTO commitments. It was also positive that all Members were aware that any solution in the DDA had to reflect the principles of S&D and 
LTFR. Many Members shared the view that not de livering on the DDA by Nairobi would send the 
wrong message about trade and development, and wo uld most probably kill the Round definitively. 
His sense was that, today, almost all Members wanted a positive outcome on the DDA, and that if 
this should happen – it should happen at MC10 in Nairobi. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 13 - 
 
  3.34.  He asked what this meant for the July work program. First, Members had to be clear that 
the establishment of a work program was not an objective in itself, but a means to deliver a successful DDA. Switzerland was of the view that the work program had to lead to a real and balanced DDA outcome, which was acceptable to all Members. It had to be substantive, but also 
doable, respecting the principles of S&D and LT FR. The work program had to include as many 
elements as possible to allow for a focused negotiation after the summer break. Only very few issues could remain open to be dealt with by Ministers at MC10. 
3.35.  He said that one way to gain increa sed acceptance among Members for a meaningful 
outcome would be to focus, wherever possible, on a levelling of the playing field. Members should 
talk concretely about different treatments and levels of commitments from the past. Such differences might have reasons rooted in earlier negotiating rounds or be a consequence of 
negotiations on accessions. 
3.36.  The work program needed to be as clearly defined as possible, in particular, in very 
technical areas, such as market access in agriculture, NAMA and services. On some more 
controversial issues, Members might not be in a position to be as specific in the short term as they 
would like to be, as long as they could not identify the contours of a possible final deal. In this case, the work program should give, however, at least very clear indications on what outcome 
Members would strive for in the second half of the year. This could be outcomes which would have 
to lead to substantive solutions for any plausible DDA deal; or to outcomes going in the direction of building a post-DDA agenda. The work program would have to respect sensitivities of all Members and might, therefore, in the view of his delegation, not go into the same depths on all 
issues. But it had to be, as the Chairman had said, a springboard for a successful Nairobi 
Ministerial Conference.  
3.37.  Finally, he recalled that the establishment of the work program could not be achieved by 
negotiating issues in separate silos and following a strict, sequenced way. On the contrary, the 
solutions had to be tackled simultaneously and horizontally. 
3.38.  The representative of Mali, on behalf of the Cotton Four (C-4), said cotton played a crucial 
economic and social role for the C-4 countries in particular, and for African countries in general. 
For this reason, the C-4 could not envisage any agreement within the WTO that did not include cotton. She said that her statement would refer to what the C-4 had said at the CoA SS meeting on 24 April. On that occasion, the C-4 had shared its assessment on the implementation of the Bali 
Decision and its view on the preparation of the post-Bali work program on cotton through its 
proposal on process in three parts. The C-4 requested that the statement made by it at the CoA SS meeting on 24 April 2015 be included in the minutes of this meeting.
1 
3.39.   The proposal included, inter alia , the holding of technical meetings dedicated to substantive 
discussions. This meant developing working hypotheses based on the different mandates and decisions on cotton, with the aim of finding a soluti on to the cotton issue by MC10, in line with the 
mandate of the Hong Kong Ministerial and on the basis of the provisions contained in the draft 
Rev.4 agriculture modalities text.  
3.40.  From this perspective, the C-4 reaffirmed once again that the time had come to move on 
from general statements and engage all stakeholders in substantive discussions on the cotton 
issue, trying to avoid falling into any consideratio n other than technical, in order to promote the 
emergence and consolidation of an acceptable solution. To this end, the C-4 remained open to any initiative aimed at finding an acceptable solution.  
3.41.  The C-4 aligned itself with the statements by Lesotho on behalf of the African Group and 
Barbados on behalf of the ACP.  
3.42.  The representative of Nepal thanked Members for the words of condolences expressed to his 
Government and people in the wake of the unprecedented natural disaster that had struck Nepal. 
He was thankful to all Members for the kind words of sympathy and the solidarity expressed at this harrowing moment of national shock and humanitarian crisis of catastrophic proportion. A massive earthquake that had shaken Nepal on Saturd ay 25 April 2015, and scores of aftershocks had 
                                               
1 The statement is reproduced in the Annex. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 14 - 
 
  devastated life and property throughout Nepal be yond imagination. Thus far, over 3,200 deaths 
had been reported, but the actual number might be much larger. The number of wounded and those trapped under the rubble was yet to be ascertained.  
3.43.  The historical and monumental heritages of the Kathmandu valley, which were on the world 
heritage list, had suffered a terrible devastation. A massive avalanche triggered by the earthquake 
had had a toll on the life of a number of mountaineers attempting to scale Mount Everest. The full scale and magnitude of property and infrastructu re damaged and destroyed by the disaster was 
yet to be assessed. This was going to amount to billions of dollars in loss, putting the poor 
country, which was emerging out of conflict, through severe stress and strain. Being probably the largest disaster after the holding of the Sendai Co nference on Disaster Risk Reduction, he believed 
that this catastrophic event had reawakened the world about the multiple hazards a predominantly 
mountainous country like Nepal was vulnerable to. At this moment, Nepal wished to express its 
sympathies and condolences for the loss and damage caused by the earthquake on the life and property in the neighbourhood, particularly in India.  
3.44.  Nepal expressed gratitude to all friendly countries, including its neighbours, UN and 
international organizations, for the immediate humanitarian responses and support provided for 
relief and rescue operations. At the same time, it appreciated very much that the international 
news media including social media had played a big role in raising global awareness about the 
adverse impacts of this disaster. Nepal needed more support in terms of equipped rescue and relief teams, medicine, food, shelter, tents and dr inking water in a coordinated manner, keeping in 
mind the needs of both Kathmandu, as well as villages in outlying areas. Rescue of wounded 
people from remote villages was possible only by helicopters. In the short and medium term, 
massive campaigns would be required for rehabilita tion of people and reconstruction of damaged 
property and infrastructure.  
3.45.  Turning to the business of this meeting, he said that his delegation firmly believed that the 
WTO should continue to work to achieve its objectives as set out in the preamble of the Marrakesh Agreement and dedicate itself not only to libera lizing trade but also addressing concerns and 
issues of LDCs for their meaningful participation in the world trading system. In the run-up to 
MC10, efforts in meeting the July deadline to develop a precise work program were Members' top most agenda. The future and fate of the Nairobi Ministerial depended very much on how quickly Members formulated and what wisdom they applied to setting the work program. In addition, the 
outcome of the DDA was contingent on the content of this work program. This was, therefore, 
going to be a crucial task for all WTO Members, in particular the LDCs.  
3.46.  The LDCs, who were the most vulnerable and weakest group in the WTO, wished to see the 
work program crafted in a manner that reflected their aspirations and ensured their meaningful 
and dignified integration into the world tradin g system. The LDCs wished to see a balanced 
document with development at the heart. As had been postulated in the Bali Ministerial Declaration 
and further reinforced by the General Council meeting on 27 November 2014, this work program 
should be built on the issues of the Bali Pack age where legally binding outcomes could not be 
achieved. While putting LDCs' prime concerns at the centre, the work program should be a milestone towards resolving remaining DDA issues. 
3.47.  As had been highlighted by other delegations, he said that agriculture, NAMA, services and 
LDC-related development issues should be the four  pillars of the work program. S&D treatment, 
being an intrinsic part of the WTO Agreement, ha d to be embodied in the work program with a 
view to providing tangible outputs to LDCs. Du e balance needed to be maintained across these 
four components keeping the development dimensio n at the centre. However, agriculture, being a 
livelihood issue and the main export item to many developing countries and LDCs, determined the 
level of ambition in NAMA and services. He urged Members to remove, and if not possible, 
significantly reduce, all kinds of trade-distortive support and measures that were crippling the agriculture exports of many poor and small econom ies. It also called upon Members to consider 
incorporating in the work program 100% duty-free, quota-free (DFQF) market access to all LDCs 
products, irrespective of their nature. He said th at Members needed to pay utmost efforts to make 
the Nairobi Conference a success through preparing a post-Bali work program before July by narrowing down divergences on major issues of the DDA. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 15 - 
 
  3.48.  The representative of the Bolivarian Republic  of Venezuela aligned itself with the statements 
by the G-33 and G-20. He said that as Ministers had done in Doha in 2001, development needed 
to be the basis of the negotiations, as the need to iron out the historic imbalances of the multilateral trading system persisted. The Doha mandate was clear and there should be no 
attempt at reinterpreting it. There needed to be flexibility to move forward on development-related 
issues, such as agriculture, cotton, S&D treatment, the LTFR principle and the single undertaking. This was the only way forward to finalize the Doha Round. He said that unfortunately, in these 
negotiations, the focus on market access persisted.  The need to reclassify WTO Members had also 
been suggested – undoing what had been achieved up to 2008. Venezuela confirmed that the basis for the negotiations had to be the 2008 texts and the development-related mandates contained in the Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration. Working on the basis of what had been 
achieved thus far would pave the way to comply with the work program to be concluded by July.  
3.49.  Venezuela was concerned that the so-called alternative proposals would mainly satisfy the 
interests of developed countries by broadening S&D treatment in their favour, while it should be 
streamlined to the benefit of developing countries . In these negotiations, developed countries had 
to show flexibility because thus far, even with what little had been achieved in Doha, they had been the historical beneficiaries of the system and the legitimate aspirations of developing 
countries that the WTO negotiations would be an effective tool in their development process had 
yet to be realized.  
3.50.  The representative of Turkey said that hi s delegation supported the efforts aimed at having 
a doable outcome on the post-Bali work program. He said that Members were only three months 
away from the July deadline, but far from finding a common ground for negotiations because of 
very divergent positions between them, especially on agriculture. He said that while it was true that the world had changed since the Doha Round had been launched, it had changed even more 
since the conclusion of the Uruguay Round. Ther efore, the imbalances in the Agreement on 
Agriculture needed to be correctly and objectively a ddressed with a spirit of fair trade. In his view, 
a focus on development, in line with th e very aim of the DDA, was also needed. 
3.51.  It was understandable that there were different approaches, priorities or positions in 
negotiations. Every Member had some legitimate  arguments to defend that needed to be 
addressed. However, converging different priorities or recalibrating the negotiated modalities should not mean reverting from agreed building blocks of the DDA. He said that if Members were 
going to start from scratch in each and every step, it would lead to the "Fabbrica del Duomo".  
3.52.  Turkey believed that the Rev.4 modalities st ill provided a strong basis for the continuation 
of negotiations in all three pillars of agriculture. As it had also observed at the last CoA SS 
meeting, the Rev.4 text had considerable supp ort amongst the Membership. In this context, 
Turkey strongly believed that the post-Bali work program had to be built on elements which had 
been agreed in different steps of the negotiations  in all three pillars of agriculture. With this 
perspective and in line with the principles agreed at the Hong Kong Ministerial in 2005, he said 
that first, the SPs and the SSM should be part of the post-Bali work program, regardless of the 
level of ambition of the agreement reached. Secondly, developing country Members without 
aggregate measure of support (AMS) commitments had to be exempt from de minimis  and OTDS 
reductions. There should not be any backtracking from these essential principles of the DDA. On 
the other hand, the overall balance should be insu red within and amongst the different pillars of 
the agriculture negotiations and none of the pillars had to be considered as a low-hanging fruit 
while the other two were only at the stage of flou rishing. For Turkey, the only element that might 
be early-harvested in agriculture was improved market access modalities for LDCs. 
3.53.  In NAMA, Turkey was of the view that th e request-and-offer approach could be used as a 
complementary method when main tariff reduction modalities were finalized. As paragraph 16 of 
the Doha mandate required Members to effectively tackle high tariffs, tariff peaks and escalations, Turkey believed that a non-linear Swiss formula still  seemed to be the best tool on the table to 
fulfil the Doha mandate. Turkey believed that the simple average tariff cuts approach, which 
tended to make more effective reductions on low duties while keeping some of the prohibitively 
high tariffs, would add to the asymmetry in the current tariff profile. On the flexibilities for developing countries, Turkey strongly believed that S&D treatment and LTFR commitments for the 
LDCs and SVEs were also essential elements of the negotiation mandate. Concerning sequencing, 
it believed that it would be realistic to say that tariff reductions should take priority over NTBs. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 16 - 
 
  3.54.  In services, he said that the guidance was Annex C of the Hong Kong Ministerial 
Declaration. He suggested that Members start with a request-and-offer process and, if areas emerged from the discussion that were of interest to Members, they could continue negotiations with a focus on those areas. Domestic regulation was an important component of the services 
negotiations. For Turkey, a work program on services that did not contain domestic regulation 
would lose most of its meaning. Disciplines on domestic regulation were vital for grasping the full benefits of the commitments undertaken by Members. Turkey could start with the 2009 or 2011 
texts. However, preserving flexibilities for developing Members would be needed. He said that 
success in this area would also inspire Members to develop disciplines on administrative measures regarding visas and temporary work permits that heavily impeded, in particular, developing country service suppliers' ability to provide services. In this context, he was referring to visas 
which entered within the scope of the Agreement, not tourist visas. Procedural delays, complex 
formalities, high costs and lack of transparency were the obstacles that its service suppliers still 
faced in the 21
st century. He said that while focusing on 21st century issues, Members should not 
set aside the problems of the past that had not been successfully solved yet. Turkey would 
continue to participate actively in the negotiations with an open mind. 
3.55.  The representative of the European Union (EU) said that over the past months, Members 
had engaged in ever more detailed discussions on the individual areas of negotiations, with the 
result that they now started having a good understanding on many issues of what was and was not doable. However, he was worried that some of the important concepts and principles had not yet been fully internalised by all.  
3.56.  Early on, in the work program process, Members had talked about the need for parallelism, 
simplification and doability, and there seemed to be a common understanding that those Members making far reaching requests on sensitive issues needed to put forward commensurate 
concessions of their own. While his delegation was seeing ambitious requests being made, the 
ensuing readiness to contribute with commensurate concessions still seemed to be missing. In the same vein, it had been clear for a long time that similar and calibrated levels of ambition needed 
to be pursued in the individual pillars of negotiations. In this regard, the question of balance had 
to continue to be the centre of Members' attention.  He said that attempting to put together a deal 
in which high ambition was pursued in certain areas in order to compensate for the fact that nothing or very little was done in others was not a recipe for success; quite the contrary. Overall, 
this aspect underlined the need for the horizontal discussion and inter-pillar trade-offs that the 
Chairman had referred to. 
3.57.  He said that similarly, trying to put certain areas before others and promoting sequencing 
ideas would not help Members succeed. While it was clear that agriculture was on everyone's mind 
and without it there could be no deal, it was equally true that no deal would be possible without the other areas. As difficult as it was, Members needed to engage on all issues and allow them to 
advance technically while keeping at the back of their minds that ambition would have to be 
adjusted and calibrated across all pillars in order to arrive at a final acceptable balance. He said that there should be no misunderstanding on this point – all issues, core and non-core, needed to form part of the work program and part of the final deal. Anything less would not work. In this 
context, it was positive that work would be rest arting in the Rules Negotiating Group on the basis 
of a technical briefing by the Secretariat on all areas of negotiations. The EU firmly believed that the WTO had an important role to play in the regulatory sphere and it would actively engage in 
preparing calibrated and viable elements for the wo rk program. A similar process would be needed 
on NTBs and on TRIPS issues, where an open and frank debate would have to take place on what was doable in the context of the work program an d how to advance on the built-in agenda from 
the Uruguay Round. 
3.58.  He said it was worrying that the need to advance was not yet shared by everyone. Recent 
discussions on services had shown that while many were ready to engage in a discussion on possible ways forward, there were also those who not only refused to engage, but also wanted to 
prevent others from doing so. This was not the co nstructive and result-oriented approach that was 
needed three months before the deadline for th e preparation of the work program and nine 
months before MC10.  
3.59.  While the EU was firmly opposed to any notion of sequencing in the limited time ahead, it 
fully understood that many Members wanted to advance on agriculture. The EU had engaged 
constructively and in an open and creative fashion in this debate and had made clear what it TN/C/M/36 
 
- 17 - 
 
  expected and what it was putting on the table in order to get a final deal. It welcomed, for 
example, the degree of convergence that was appe aring on export competition and the need for a 
balanced outcome across the entire pillar.  
3.60.  The discussion so far had rightly focused on  domestic support, where the EU had also been 
clear about its interest and readiness to have an ambitious outcome. This could not mean, 
however, that while some Members would dramatically cut their trade-distorting domestic support, others would be allowed to increase their spending to levels never before seen. Trade-distorting 
domestic support was a common concern and everyone needed to contribute to addressing it. 
Creative ideas had been put on the table, which merited further exploration, and eventually more would be needed. Nevertheless, the debates of re cent weeks had shown that the best that could 
be collectively hoped for in this Round would be an outcome which respected current policies, 
whilst seeking to limit excessive increases in the use of trade-distorting measures. This, together 
with further flexibilities that would be needed in order to address the public stockholding issue, would have an impact on all other areas of negotiations.  
3.61.  He said that crucially, the approach on agricultural market access would have to mirror the 
overall direction taken on domestic support. Progress in this area would only be possible on the basis of a simplified approach, which while setting a clear benchmark in terms of tariff reductions, 
would give Members the necessary flexibility in deciding which tariff lines to cut. Such an approach 
would ensure an appropriate level of ambition  without necessitating the introduction of 
complicating factors, which would be disproportionate to the overall approach being taken. The approach on agricultural market access would have a knock-on effect on NAMA, where averaging 
would seem the most promising way of proceeding. It would give a meaningful result while 
providing Members with flexibility in terms of implementation. 
3.62.  He said that Members were steadily approaching a tipping point, which would decide the 
fate of these negotiations. It was his firm belief that now more than ever, all Members needed to 
focus on the realistic and the doable. Members needed to be clear in their minds whether they would prefer to get a deal in the near future and close the DDA with the doable and meaningful 
results which were within reach, or hold out for something bigger which might, however, never 
materialise. The EU had made its choice and was set on doing everything it could to bring the current process to a successful outcome in MC10. It wanted the WTO to remain an efficient and effective negotiating forum and hoped that others would join it in achieving this objective. 
3.63.  The representative of Uruguay associated his delegation with the statement by Brazil on 
behalf of the G-20. He said that the Chairman ha d clearly identified the problems that needed to 
be solved. A better understanding of these problems was already a considerable achievement and 
should provide Members with direction in order to identify what was solvable and what was not in 
the short time remaining.  
3.64.  For Uruguay a substantial outcome in agriculture was vital and it was what his country 
expected from this process. With regard to do mestic support and its various components, Uruguay 
hoped that the negotiations would fulfil what had been established in the Doha Declaration, in the sense of ensuring a commitment by all Members to substantially reduce trade-distorting domestic support measures, on the understanding that those Members that applied more trade-distorting 
subsidies should make greater efforts. The OTDS was a very important concept in this area and 
vital to levelling the playing field in a sector where there were such distortions at work. Uruguay was aware of the difficulties in bridging positions. For this reason, it was prepared to participate 
constructively in discussions exploring alternative solutions. But it could and would not accept a 
result that represented a step backwards in the reform process of the agricultural sector nor would it accept a zero-ambition result.  
3.65.  With regard to market access, the propos als of Argentina and Paraguay had helped provide 
fresh momentum to Members' discussions, leading them to consider different scenarios. As for 
export competition and especially agriculture expo rt subsidies, there had been substantial progress 
and it would be important to see how the obligation to eliminate these subsidies would be 
implemented. This would be a considerable achievement in itself.  
3.66.  He reiterated his delegation's willingness to work constructively in other areas of the 
negotiations, such as NAMA and services. However,  for his delegation, the feedback process only TN/C/M/36 
 
- 18 - 
 
  worked in one direction. If there were clear sign als of progress in agriculture, then Members could 
move forward with NAMA and services. Development issues had to be clearly incorporated into the detailed work program because this would respond to the needs of a large number of Members.  
3.67.  In recent weeks, there had been references to the fact that the level of ambition had made 
these negotiations more complex and difficult than expected and, for this reason, expectations had 
to be recalibrated. Uruguay saw this differently – it was precisely this high level of ambition amongst Members and the expectations placed in th e multilateral trading system that had enabled 
Members, even 14 year after the launch of the Doha Round, to continue to make great efforts to 
try and fulfil the Doha negotiating mandate.  
3.68.  Uruguay could not renounce the opportunity to achieve an ambitious outcome to this 
Round. This was not only about settling an historic debt with the agriculture sector, but it was an 
opportunity to provide greater predictability in an international context characterized by high 
volatility and uncertainty. Now more than ever, the WTO and the multilateral trading system 
needed to be strengthened. This would only be possible if Members were capable of concluding 
this long negotiating process. Despite the difficulties, Uruguay remained positive in its objective to 
achieve a high level of ambition in these discussions that would allow all Members to achieve tangible outcomes in the different areas of the negotiations.  
3.69.  The representative of Japan wished to make  three points. First, on the positive side, he 
welcomed the increased number of ideas and proposals, many of them with the necessary 
recalibration. He strongly supported some of them, like the recent one on anti-dumping, but others 
too were sincere and great contributions to the process. Second, on the worrisome side, he said 
that some Members, including some major ones, still stuck to the concept of sequencing, as had 
been apparent in the consultation process in Rules and in trade in services, despite the appeal from the Chairman and the fact that no Member was so surrealistic as to imagine cherry-picking 
outcomes only in these areas without any meanin gful outcomes in agriculture and NAMA. Third, 
under these circumstances, in order to establish a work program which was clearly defined and credible enough to lead to the conclusion of the DDA, Members should build on the positive 
progress with more detailed discussions and using some hypothetical figures. They should also 
instruct their experts and urge or recommend capitals to engage in all aspects of the consultations putting aside the harmful concept of sequencing at this crucial stage, the last chance to conclude the DDA negotiations. 
3.70.  He recalled that Sir Paul McCartney was in Japan. For the first and second days of his 
performance, the first song was "Magical Mystery Tour". But from the third day, he had kicked off with "Eight Days a week". Although he was not an  expert on DDA, he seemed to urge Members to 
"Come Together" if they did not wish to be seen as "Fools on the Hill". 
3.71.  The representative of the United States said that as had been made clear by the Chairs' 
reports, Members were collectively in a very difficult spot. The effort for recalibration that reality 
dictated and which most Members acknowledged as necessary, was proving as challenging as 
other modes and mechanisms that had been tried in the past. Nonetheless, recalibration had been happening. Like others, the United States was deeply disappointed that its original aspirations for the Round had not been realized. The United Stat es had consistently believed that Members had 
had a real opportunity, from 2001 forward, to bring about significant, new liberalization that would 
advance the economic development prospects of all Members, particularly developing Members. That opportunity, if not completely evaporated , had been extensively eroded. Therefore, its 
expectations had taken a big fall. Nevertheless, in order to arrive at a work program that reflected 
balance and some acceptable degree of ambition, there were still some things the United States expected that it knew were difficult for certain Members. 
3.72.  The United States knew that its insistence that all major agricultural subsidizers participate 
in taking on new disciplines for trade-distorting support was difficult for certain other Members. It knew, as well, that some other Members did not want to hear that it could not be acceptable for only some Members to contribute cuts in applied tariffs while others contributed only policy space. 
His delegation knew that many Members were deep ly attached to the Rev. 3 and Rev.4 texts. His 
delegation found this misguided, since those texts had never found consensus. He said that the very reasons that had prevented consensus in 2008 had grown more profound in the seven years 
since, namely the changed role of emerging economies.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 19 - 
 
  3.73.  Frequent references had been made to the mandate. He said that if finding a solution were 
as simple as adhering to the mandate, Members would have done so a decade ago. The truth was 
that the mandate was ambiguous and Members had ne ver agreed on what it meant. They had not 
agreed on how to operationalize the mandate as an actual trade agreement. Some of those who 
cited the mandate most seemed always to skip over the parts they did not like, including the 
guidance from the Eighth Ministerial Conference  (MC8) in 2011, when Ministers had directed 
Members to "explore different negotiating approaches".  
3.74.  Therefore, Members were finding that recalib ration might not be as easy as they would have 
liked, in that it did not do away with a constellation of conflicting political and policy difficulties that were extremely hard to reconcile. The United States did not discount the political difficulties being voiced by a number of its negotiating partners. It had taken them at face value. The difficultly was 
that, taken together and combined with the reality that the United States and others would not 
contribute disproportionately to results, as seem ed to be expected by some, Members were left 
with a set of conflicts that appeared very challenging to resolve. He said that his delegation had 
been honest and direct with its capital and with its stakeholders. It hoped that others were doing 
the same. Members could not bury their head in th e sand and wish reality away. In April 2015, the 
choice was clear: either Members adapted their coll ective expectations significantly and quickly, or 
the WTO had to begin to confront the prospect of a definitive failure. 
3.75.  At this juncture, three months from the en d of July and eight months from December, there 
was still time – just barely – to adapt work to reality. Members should not delude themselves, however, in believing that the world's patience for the Doha Round was without limits. If there 
were no results at Nairobi, many outside Geneva were likely to disregard this Institution as a 
forum for problem-solving. This would squander the momentum and good will that all Members had worked so hard to achieve in Bali and the following year.  
3.76.  Over the following few weeks, the United States would be reflecti ng carefully on this 
assessment and looking for opportunities to engage with its partners and explore productive options under these difficult circumstances. The United States expressed appreciation to the 
Chairman for his role in encouraging all Members at this meeting, even in the face of obvious 
difficulties. He said the Chairman was right to remind Members of the difficulties they had overcome – against the odds – before and after Bali. The United States would continue to work creatively. But it would insist that the conversations take place in the real world. The future 
credibility of this Institution was at stake and the clock was ticking. 
3.77.  The representative of Argentina associated his delegation with the statement by Brazil on 
behalf of the G-20. In agriculture, the process of  lowering the level of ambition seemed to have 
brought Members to zero results in market access, or at best, to some cosmetic improvements 
that would guarantee the persistence of the trade barriers inherited from the Uruguay Round. Thus far, the CoA SS had not addressed the key issues in market access that had a specific mandate 
and that were of vital importance for developing countries, such as tariff peaks, tariff escalations, 
in-quota duties or tariff si mplification amongst others. 
3.78.  In domestic support, any progress seemed improbable at the moment. The question that 
arose was if it would be possible to have a post-Bali work program without any result in this pillar. 
Argentina's reply was that it would not be possible to have a program that did not foresee progress 
in the three pillars of the agriculture reform process, especially in export competition. It was important to continue working and exploring altern atives in line with the mandate and the work 
already carried out. Argentina supported the C-4 initiative to find a solution to the cotton issue in 
accordance with the mandate on domestic support. His delegation was ready to contribute.  
3.79.  In export competition, Argentina saw with concern that apart from declarations of political 
will, Members that continued to use export subsidies had put conditions to an early harvest of this 
pillar for MC10. Argentina pointed out that it would never be early enough to harvest an effective outcome in the export competition pillar.  
3.80.  With regard to the issues proposed by so me delegations, such as geographical indications 
and export restrictions, he pointed out that on the first issue, there was no Doha mandate for 
negotiations and therefore it was not a "remaining" DDA issue that could be part of the post-Bali agenda; on the second issue, it was not acceptable or achievable for Argentina to strengthen TN/C/M/36 
 
- 20 - 
 
  disciplines on the export side, when on the impo rt side there were still barriers to trade in 
agriculture that operated as import prohibitions. Preparing the work program was dependent on achieving progress in agriculture. Therefore, in the time available between now and July, Members 
had to focus on overcoming the impasse in do mestic support and moving forward on market 
access issues that had not yet been considered in the CoA SS.  
3.81.  The post-Bali work program had to focus on development and reflect in a balanced way the 
interests of all developing countries, recognizing th e structural differences between the agriculture, 
industrial and services sectors of developed, developing and least-developed countries.  
3.82.  The representative of Uganda aligned his delegation with the statements by Lesotho on 
behalf of the African Group, Barbados on behalf of the ACP Group, and Indonesia on behalf of the 
G-33.  
3.83.  His delegation wished to continue to draw Members' attention to issues of paramount 
importance to it. Ministers in Bali had directed Members to prepare a clearly defined work program 
on the remaining DDA issues. To respond to the question on what could be done, given that it 
might not be possible to have a detailed modalities-type work program by 31 July 2015, he said 
that his delegation's view had remained the same since last year. It had proposed that Members have a dedicated discussion on the nature and type of the work program. It still did not 
understand why Members needed another work program when the DDA already had a detailed 
work programme. It agreed that there was no time. There were principles that had been declared at the start of 2014, such as doability, realism, et c. This was the time to rely on these principles. 
He said that Members needed to come up with a simple list of areas for discussion, in the spirit of 
paragraph 1.11 of the Bali Ministerial Declaration,  which had instructed Members to conclude the 
remaining elements of the DDA. Members had been fu rther asked to prioritize those outcomes that 
had not been legally binding in nature, and these included LDC-specific issues.  
3.84.  He said that the challenge with the current course of action was that it seemed to suggest 
that there could be a tendency to disregard all the work that had been done before. If Members 
continued to insist that the modalities texts of NAMA and agriculture had not been agreed upon, 
how about the DDA Work Programme? How about th e July framework? There was also the Hong 
Kong Ministerial Declaration which had further fleshed out the understanding in the July framework. The question which had preoccupied hi s delegation was what Members really wanted. 
What were they trying to achieve? What sort of remaining elements were they trying to come up 
with that were not already well laid out in these documents? Were they seeking to set aside their 
own and Ministers' Decisions? To illustrate the point, in the Special Session of the Committee on Trade and Development (CTD SS), the LDC Group had submitted a list of provisions to aid work in 
the Committee. The challenge was about process as opposed to substance. The issue had been the 
lack of clarity on the specific outputs for July and for MC10. Would negotiations start on the basis 
of those provisions with precise language, as his delegation wished to see? How would this be 
reflected in the work program? What would be reflected in the work program? Would it be the list 
of provisions, or the initial detailed proposals, or the language negotiated upon submission of the detailed proposal? If it was the third scenario, what would Members do between July and December considering that, hypothetically, the ne gotiation process would have been exhausted? 
3.85.  As an LDC delegation, time was not on th eir side. Every day that passed without concluding 
the Round was time lost that continued to leave them in a vulnerable situation. In Doha, Ministers had agreed to seek to put the needs and interests of developing countries, and especially the 
LDCs, at the heart of the work programme. In that  vein, therefore, Uganda fully endorsed all the 
points raised by the LDC coordinator, Bangladesh, at the latest General Council meeting with regard to the elements for the work program and wished to add that while agriculture would set 
the level of ambition in the negotiations, there should be balance between agriculture, NAMA and 
services. Development should be at the centre of the negotiations and the principle of single undertaking should be preserved in line with paragraph 47. Members needed to focus on the conclusion of the DDA without introducing new issues. The draft modalities texts should be the 
basis of negotiations. Language on S&D treatment for LDCs and developing countries should be 
preserved. He said that his delegation would be interested in discussions on domestic support measures, especially those that distort the market, as well as export competition in line with the 
Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration. In NAMA, market access alone in the traditional sense was not 
the key concern for most LDCs. It was NTBs. Members should therefore give practical effect to the agreement to eliminate all NTBs on products originating from LDCs. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 21 - 
 
  3.86.  The representative of Korea said that the good news was that Members shared a sense of 
urgency and were actively engaged in the negotiations based on various proposals while aiming at 
recalibration. Members had had deeper discussions across the board. However, his delegation was 
somewhat discouraged by the speed and quality of  t h e  p r o g r e s s  m a d e  s o  f a r .  H e  s a i d  t h a t  a t  
present, Members were still far from reaching a common understanding even on what the work 
program should look like, not to mention its substance.  
3.87.  Seeking the right balance among the key areas of agriculture market access, domestic 
support and NAMA was central to shaping the work program. It was noted that the deadlock over 
gateway issues in domestic support, among others, was hampering further progress in other areas, in particular agriculture market access and NAMA. The July deadline for the work program 
was around the corner. He said that the current difficulties in one area should not be used as an 
excuse to sit idle in discussing other areas. Members had to accelerate their discussions reflecting 
on this reality. If the current situation continued, establishing a modalities-like, detailed work program by July might be elusive. It was, theref ore, important to agree on what sort and what 
level of work program was acceptable to Members, while paying due regard to the Doha mandate 
and the discussions thus far. Members had to make every effort to come up with a meaningful structure of a document or a framework that could lead them to a concrete and successful 
outcome at the MC10. 
3.88.  He said that many delegations were confused with the ambiguity of the concepts of 
recalibration and simplification as a means to achieve Members' goals. In his delegation's view, it would be neither productive nor healthy to attempt to define the recalibration or simplification 
purely in a semantic manner. No matter what the recalibration or simplification, it had to be 
designed to respect the essential interests and red lines of the Members concerned. In this sense, 
his delegation once again urged those proposing reca libration or simplification to present concrete 
proposals and figures as early as possible. He said that the WTO, in its 20
th anniversary, could not 
afford to disappoint. Success would require leadership particularly from the major players as well as constructive engagement by all Members. In this regard, Korea was ready to do its part.  
3.89.  The representative of China associated his delegation with the statements by Indonesia for 
the G-33, Brazil for the G-20, and Saudi Arabia for the RAMs. China appreciated the tremendous 
work that the Chairman and the Chairs of the ne gotiating bodies had done since the previous TNC 
meeting. Through waves of intensive consultations, Members had had a better understanding of 
each other's positions, difficulties and particularly political sensitivities. However, having listened 
to the Chairs' reports and Members' interventions at the present meeting, it seemed hard to say that Members had achieved the much needed progress in the negotiations. The summer break was 
around the corner and the countdown to MC10 had started. With less than three months left 
before the July deadline, China was very concer ned. The question was whether Members would be 
able to live up to the Ministers' mandate and deliver a clearly defined, modality-like post-Bali work 
program on time.  
3.90.  He wished to share with Members some of  his delegation's observations that he believed 
were essential for the negotiations. First, given the convergence and divergence among Members, Rev.4 and Rev.3 should be the basis and the benchmark for the negotiations. He said that while it 
was true that those texts were not in final agreement, it was equally true that after several 
months of heated discussions and the exploration of a handful of new approaches, no more viable approach had been found that could gather more support and consensus than Rev.4 and Rev.3. 
3.91.  Second, some Members were talking about recalibration of Rev.4 and Rev.3. China could 
not prevent them from exploring new ideas. But, any recalibration could not move away from the 
negotiating mandates established by previous Ministerial Conferences, such as the Doha 
Declaration, the July Package, the Hong Kong Decl aration and the Bali Declaration. He said that as 
a matter of principle, whatever the new approaches might be, it was important to ensure that all Members moved in the same direction. In othe r words, Members could not afford having a 
scenario where some Members were given more fl exibility while some other Members would have 
less or would even be required to do more than what was required in the 2008 modalities.  
3.92.  His delegation noted with grave concern that it was exactly what was happening in the 
domestic support pillar of the agriculture negotiations, where some Members were allowing 
themselves to do less while requesting others to do more. He asked if, in this sense, recalibration 
was collective or selective. This was a question that Members needed to answer.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 22 - 
 
  3.93.  In the case of market access in the agricult ural negotiations, he said that should existing 
simplified approaches be adopted, some major players would have flexibilities that would allow them to do less tariff reduction by  20%, while other Members would have to contribute as much as 
what was required by Rev.4. He said that such an approach would neither build consensus nor lead 
to any meaningful outcome. Likewise, if recalibrati on served to reduce the level of ambition, then 
such a recalibration had to properly tackle thr ee fundamental questions: how much?; where?; and 
for whom and on what basis? He was asking how much the overall level of ambition would be 
reduced, where the reductions should be – in whic h sectors and pillars, and for whom and on what 
basis the level of ambition would be reduced. He said that the bottom line was that the final result 
of recalibration had to be impartial and balanced. In the process of recalibration, every Member held the key. But it believed that the demandeurs  of recalibration should turn their key first. 
3.94.  Third, the DDA was a development Round an d such a theme should be reflected in every 
aspect of and throughout the entire negotiations. The special situation of LDCs, SVEs, etc. should be taken care of. Under no circumstances should the development dimension be denied and the 
direction of DDA be changed merely because of the assumption that the world had changed. 
He said that the central theme of the Round was simple – to let developing Members gain more benefits with less contribution. Taking the RAMs, fo r example, it was widely recognized that they 
had joined the Organization after the Uruguay Round with more substantive and extensive 
commitments compared to other Members. They had lo wer tariff rates, no water in tariff structures 
and a limited policy toolbox. For the RAMs, any cuts in tariffs would be real cuts, in flesh and bones. This was why there were some special arrangements for the RAMs in all existing 
negotiating mandates and in the 2008 modality texts, which should be respected.  
3.95.  Another example was the domestic support pillar in the agriculture negotiations. He said 
that it was neither reasonable nor scientific to calculate the amount of subsidies and arrive at the 
conclusion without differentiating supports of diffe rent nature, purposes, history and size in terms 
of per capita. Such oversimplified comparison was unjustified. Any accountable government with a limited policy toolbox would not jump into a political decision when the implication of its future 
policy was entirely uncertain. This, he said, was like asking a person to jump into a river or lake 
with a blindfold. Trade was getting freer, but not all elements of production related to trade moved freely yet across borders, such as the labour force. Therefore, it was up to the governments on their own to take care of their small farmers and the subsistence of hundreds of millions. He asked 
how such governments could be expected to make a decision regardless of the above 
responsibilities. 
3.96.  Fourth, it was hard to envisage a scenario where any key negotiating areas, such as 
services and Rules, were excluded from the fi nal package. Ministers had clearly instructed 
Members to make progress in these areas in line with the negotiating mandate. China encouraged Members to have more substantive discussions in the following months and a rich negotiated 
outcome with a level of ambition comparable to that of agriculture and NAMA. 
3.97.  Finally, he said that the Doha Round was far more complex than any of the previous 
Rounds. While each Member was a stakeholder, it  was unfair and unreasonable to expect a limited 
number of Members to make contributions to save the Round. What was needed was to avoid 
finger-pointing and join hands to find a doable solution. If Members continued haggling over one 
or two issues, they would never be able to achiev e the goal set by Ministers. The management of 
the process had been correct, in the previous month. The question was whether Members would 
continue with such an approach or be more creative. China believed that the latter was more 
relevant. All Members needed to face up to reality and build up mutual trust. Only in such a way, could they appropriately manage the process and accelerate work with a sense of urgency, while 
guaranteeing transparency and inclusiveness. He said that his delegation was fully committed to 
working with the Chairman and all other Members to conclude this negotiation as per the Ministers' mandate. 
3.98.  The representative of Paraguay said that in agriculture domestic support, his country wished 
to see disciplines that promoted reform and that brought about similar results for the majority, so 
as to level the playing field. Paraguay believed that S&D treatment had to be part of the result, 
delivering different levels of commitments. Yet, Paraguay believed that limits had to be applied 
equally to all. It was desirable to establish a numerical limit for the OTDS and, as much as 
possible, the elimination or reduction to the mini mum of the AMS. If this was not possible, then TN/C/M/36 
 
- 23 - 
 
  Members had to look at alternatives, such as combining the numerical limit for the OTDS with the 
maintenance of the de minimis  as a percentage of the value of production for all.  
3.99.  In market access, Paraguay reiterated its wi llingness to continue to work in order to make 
swift progress. Its objective was greater convergence of tariffs amongst Members towards levels 
that would favour trade and avoid the consolidation of prohibitive or very high tariffs. For 
Paraguay, tariffs above 50% were not desirable. With regard to the SSM, Paraguay believed that the mechanism had to respond exclusively to exce ptional circumstances, have limited coverage, 
not be freely available, have a sunset clause and its use be avoided for consecutive periods.  
3.100.  With regard to the discussion on public stockholding, Paraguay believed that the solution 
had to be found on the basis of the Decision adopted in Bali, by making transparency requirements compulsory and facilitating the application of the GATT safeguards when suspicions of dumping of 
stocks on international markets arose. In any case, his delegation believed that price manipulation 
policies could not be adopted and included in the green box.  
3.101.  Paraguay reiterated that the commitment to  eliminate of all forms of export subsidies had 
to be fulfilled as soon as possible. The existence of this kind of export subsidies was used to justify 
recourse to protectionist measures and could have an  impact on the work of millions of farmers.  
3.102.  In NAMA, Paraguay welcomed the effo rts of the Chair, Ambassador Winzap, and the 
Secretariat in presenting different scenarios for tariff cuts. But most of all, Paraguay sought to 
include NTB treatment in the work program. His delegation believed that these measures were one of the main barriers to products from developing countries and was ready to take part in these discussions.  
3.103.  In services, it welcomed the session on aspirations held by the Chair of the Special 
Session. It also welcomed the suggestion to includ e services that facilitated trade in goods, such 
as those related to trade facilitation, logistics, transport and telecommunication. This would reduce 
international trade costs, which was fundamental for landlocked countries such as Paraguay. 
It also welcomed the fact that discussions on emergency safeguards had been shelved; something that it would like to see also in the agriculture negotiations.  
3.104.  Finally, Paraguay fully supported the Chairman's efforts on Aid for Trade and the next 
Conference on Financing for Development. This was a vital element to level the playing field for all 
and represented actions that landlocked countries fo llowed with interest, in view of the programme 
of action that had been approved last November.  
3.105.  The representative of Norway said that  his delegation shared the Chairman's overall 
assessment and agreed that in going forward, development would have to be at the centre of 
work. Results in agriculture, NAMA and services would be decisive for development. Norway, like 
other Members, acknowledged the fact that agriculture was central to the work of Members and 
that its outcome would define the level of ambition in other areas. However, it was increasingly concerned with the lack of progress in the other ne gotiating pillars. As had been underlined by the 
EU amongst others, the work program would have to address all negotiating areas. But unless 
Members started discussions on substance in all ne gotiating groups in parallel, they would not 
succeed.  
3.106.  Norway had only defensive interests in agriculture. Nevertheless, it was engaging actively 
in the agricultural negotiations and had done so for a long time. It expected other Members to do 
the same in areas of interest to Norway, even if they did not share its interests in those specific negotiating areas. In the current political environment, all Members had to revise their positions 
and adjust them to political realities. This was why Norway was continuously working, including 
with the Friends of Anti-dumping Negotiations (FANs), the Friends of Fish and various Members in the agricultural pillar, to try and adjust its positions. 
3.107.  His delegation agreed with the Chairman's view that in order to arrive at the necessary 
compromises, a horizontal process enabling trade-offs would be essential. All Members knew that if they continued to stick to old positions, there would be no result. Norway feared that this might 
be the last chance to deliver on the Doha Development Mandate and therefore called on all 
Members, and in particular the major players, to intensify their efforts to finding a compromise TN/C/M/36 
 
- 24 - 
 
  that was acceptable to all. His delegation agreed with others that previous mandates from 
Ministers needed to be respected. In particular, his delegation believed that Members should be guided by the instructions from Ministers at MC8 – to look for alternative approaches in order to find the solutions that would allow Members to finalize the DDA. 
3.108.  The representative of Colombia said that Members had been embarking on a constructive 
process. It was not easy to step aside from posi tions that had been entrenched for years. It was 
not easy to take up texts that had not been re vised for some time. But Colombia appreciated the 
fact that there had been good disposition and willingness to do so. It was important to keep this 
spirit alive. However, this effort was not enough. It was clear that Members were far from completing the task that had been entrusted to them. He said that his delegation joined others in calling for one simple thing – getting the job done. By this, he referred to increasing Members' 
activity in terms of exploring alternatives and involving capitals to help study these alternatives, 
examine possible solutions, build new proposals and run the necessary numbers. He referred to 
doing what was necessary to increase Members' participation in this work. Concluding the work 
program on time was not the job of a few, but of all WTO Members.  
3.109.  His call also referred to working in all areas. Colombia was concerned to hear once again 
the talk of "sequencing". This was equivalent to adopting a tunnel vision and refraining from 
achieving results in all areas until there was progress in certain issues of interest. Colombia 
attached great importance to achieving results in  agriculture, but it was aware that a successful 
conclusion required progress in other areas. His delegation was ready to move forward in parallel in these discussions. Focusing on the three core i ssues did not mean forgetting the rest. Ministers' 
mandate referred to all remaining DDA issues and Members had to continue exploring what 
possibilities there were to develop the work program. These issues could, in turn, help find the required balance.  
3.110.  He said that as the deadline to conclude the task at hand approached, it was normal to feel 
worried as there was still a lot to be done. However, the solution was not to start looking at alternatives to a robust and detailed work program. On the contrary, it was time to reaffirm 
Members' commitment. It was time to make the most of the time available and prepare for some 
long days and weekends in July at the WTO. Colombia was certain that the effort would be worth it. In 2013, Members saw that progress could be made in a short time, if there were political will and the commitment to achieve results. Colombia called upon the whole Membership to commit to 
getting the job done.  
3.111.  The representative of Pakistan said that since the last TNC meeting, Members had had 
intense deliberations that had rendered a better understanding of sensitivities in the three core 
areas of agriculture, NAMA and services. Regretta bly, that had not been enough, as Members still 
continued to lack consensus on what was the achievable right balance in the market access modalities for every Member in each of those areas.  
3.112.  In agriculture, market access, domestic support and export competition were closely linked 
and had an internal balance. Therefore, any mean ingful outcome had to address all three pillars, 
including food security policies and their unintended consequences. In NAMA, his delegation not only believed that work on tariff cutting modalities was crucial, but also on NTBs, as they 
increasingly posed serious barriers to market access. In services, work on domestic regulations 
remained central as domestic regulations played an important role in determining the level of market access. Therefore, a development-oriented  outcome had to address all these three core 
issues along with work on other issues with the ob jective of ensuring the integration of developing 
countries and LDCs into the global trading system . On Rules, his delegation believed that the 
briefing sessions in May would be helpful for Memb ers to reflect on advancing the work program.  
3.113.  He said that Members had a collective responsibility and a shared objective to keep the 
multilateral system relevant and vibrant. Priority  had to be given to the development dimension in 
the negotiating work alongside the regular WTO work, with the objective of increasing competitiveness of small and medium enterprises through an appropriate policy framework. 
His delegation continued to remain actively enga ged in the consultation process and was open to 
creative solutions that fulfilled development objectives while recognizing future challenges. His delegation sought a meaningful and mutually advantageous outcome and was ready to engage 
constructively with all Members. Despite all the apprehensions expressed at the present meeting, 
his delegation believed that the Chairman's constructive engagement and proactive role in TN/C/M/36 
 
- 25 - 
 
  engaging Members to find a common solution could provide a solution-oriented result that would 
be acceptable to the Members, with a view to addressing their legitimate concerns. 
3.114.  The representative of Cuba endorsed the st atements by the coordinators of the G-33, G-20 
and ACP Group. Agriculture had to continue being the engine of the Doha negotiations, with a view 
to completing the post-Bali work program. It could not be ignored that what happened in this area 
would impact the rest of the mandates, such as  NAMA and services, amongst others. Therefore, 
Members had to keep their focus on making prog ress in agriculture, in accordance with the 
mandates from Doha and subsequent meetings. Recalibrating or considering new options could not 
lead to a reinterpretation, much less, to ignoring what had been agreed or trying to reverse it. The 
reform process in agriculture had to aim at re-establishing the longstanding imbalances that persisted in this sector. Therefore, Rev.4 remained the best guide that Members had obtained thus 
far. In this regard, Cuba considered that SPs and the SSM had to be an integral part of the post-
Bali work program, in whatever format it would be adopted.  
3.115.  S&D treatment was a principle where commitments were clearly identified in all the 
mandates of the Doha Work Programme adopted in  2001, therefore it needed to be respected and 
addressed as a matter of priority. In this contex t, the demands of the LDCs and SVEs stood out. 
The additional flexibilities required by many deve loping countries, such as Cuba, also had to be 
adequately ensured.  
3.116.  It would also be important to continue working on reforming the DSU. Members had to be 
pragmatic and recognize that balanced results were needed. Amongst them, the proposals that 
represented the specific interests of developing countries, including access to the system and 
effective compliance, would be vital. Members had to avoid the temptation that had prevailed in 
previous occasions of diluting those proposals that promoted clear objectives in favour of developing countries. Cuba reiterated its commitment to working constructively to fully comply 
with the Doha mandates.  
3.117.  The representative of Singapore said that as Members considered how to move ahead, it 
was useful to recall why they had started the Ro und and what they had all hoped to achieve some 
14 years ago. In the Doha Declaration, Ministers had expressed their determination to maintain 
the process of reform and liberalisation of trade po licies, thus ensuring that the system played its 
full part in promoting recovery, growth and development. They had also declared that international trade could play a major role in the promotion of economic development and the alleviation of 
poverty.
 The world had changed. But, trade liberalisat ion remained a driver of economic growth 
and development. Delivering the post-Bali work program and finishing the Doha Round was therefore not just about adhering to a Ministerial mandate. It was about fulfilling a commitment to 
growth, reform and development.  
3.118.  It was in this context that Singapore hoped to see a credible and meaningful outcome by 
July and a successful Nairobi Ministerial. While Singapore acknowledged that the gateway issues 
remained in agriculture, its view was that discussions needed to be intensified, concurrently and in 
parallel across the negotiating pillars. Time was running out and Members did not have the luxury of sequencing and waiting for one area to unlock before starting work on another.  
3.119.  Her delegation was under no illusions that concluding the DDA or even coming up with a 
work programme would be easy. As long as the trust deficit amongst Members remained, a 
watered-down work program would require just as much effort to negotiate as a full modalities one. Nevertheless, as an old friend of the sy stem, Singapore was hopeful that a meaningful 
outcome could be achieved if efforts were redoubled. Singapore stood ready to contribute in every 
way possible for this to come to fruition.  
3.120.  The representative of Costa Rica agreed with the Chairman's assessment, but was 
concerned by the little time that remained to meet the mandate to agree to a work program by 
July. Costa Rica recognized that the issues of agri culture, NAMA and services were at the heart of 
the work program and the focus of Members' efforts. On the other hand, it believed that Members had to make the most and capitalize on progress in all areas. For this reason, his delegation 
supported parallel discussions in all areas and agreed with the Chairman that Members had to 
avoid establishing any de facto  sequencing.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 26 - 
 
  3.121.  In agriculture, Costa Rica was concerned by the difficulties that persisted on essential 
areas, such as domestic support and market access . It continued to be concerned by the proposal 
on a SSM as had been presented. If such an instrument were to exist, it had to be used in very exceptional circumstances. Therefore, it had to be defined very clearly so that it offered certainty 
and predictability to exporters and so that its arbitrary and unjustified use was made impossible. 
Members also had to ensure that the use of the mechanism did not affect normal trade growth, especially South-South trade, and that it was applied only to products subject to tariff reductions 
as a result of the Doha Round. On the other hand, Costa Rica, together with the Tropical Products 
Group, had reiterated its interest in meeting the longstanding commitment to fully liberalize trade in tropical products. Progress made in this ar ea, that resulted from the agreements reached 
in 2009 on Tropical Products and Preference Erosion, should be preserved and form part of the 
post-Bali work program. 
3.122.  In services, there was an urgent need to update Members' commitments and the WTO 
rules. Many countries had moved forward at the bilateral and plurilateral levels by signing free 
trade agreements (FTAs) with modern rules and u pdated commitments in the area of services. The 
multilateral trading system had to be able to respond to the needs and interests of the real economy and give services the importance it deserved in today's world. For this reason, Costa Rica 
welcomed the meeting of the Special Session of th e Council for Trade in Services (CTS SS) held 
the previous week which had given Members the op portunity to share their ideas on the elements 
that should form part of the work program in this area. Costa Rica hoped that this dynamic continued in the discussions at the 7 May meeting.  
3.123.  Costa Rica reiterated the call to direct Members' work in the right direction. There were 
few weeks remaining. Apart from the time issues , it was about the credibility of the WTO in 
carrying out its negotiating function, responding to current needs and continuing to be relevant in 
today's world.  
3.124.  The representative of the Russian Federation said that as Members had exactly three 
months to meet the July deadline for a post-Bali wo rk program, it wished to share Russia's position 
on the substance of the process. The Russian Fede ration had joined the WTO less than three years 
ago and was still in the difficult process of adjusting its economy to the terms and conditions of accession. With that in mind, it had made a significant contribution to the liberalization of world trade. As stated on many occasions, in many  aspects RAMs' WTO commitments went well beyond 
those of many Members. In negotiating its term s of accession, Russia had been guided by the 
understandings reached in the context of the Doha Round, in particular, by the 2008 modalities. It, therefore, asked Members to respect the core elements of these understandings.  
3.125.  Agriculture was one of the fundamental elem ents for Russia. Within the three agricultural 
pillars, domestic support was the most challeng ing. He said that Russia expected the same 
meaningful level of ambition from all WTO Members which had been required from it in the course 
of its accession negotiations. On export competition, Russia supported the prohibition of all forms 
of direct export subsidies and the establishment of  stricter disciplines on other export competition 
instruments. It had implemented this commitment since August 2012. In its view, the post-Bali work program should include a clear commitment to deliver on export competition at MC10. On 
market access and safeguards issues in particular, it believed that if any existing or proposed 
safeguard instrument was still in place as a result of the Doha negotiations, Members had to make sure that it was not used as an excuse to restrict trade. Members needed to bear in mind the 
linkage between real market access and any possible mechanism of agricultural safeguards. As for 
other issues raised in recent consultations, in particular export restrictions, Russia trusted that if Members wished to conclude the Round, they had to finalize what was already on the table and 
add such other issues only after that. 
3.126.  In NAMA, its position was similar to that in agriculture. Accession commitments should be 
factored into the overall results of the Round. With that in mind, his delegation was ready to engage into substantive discussions on non-tariff measures.  
3.127.  His delegation welcomed the resumption of a substantive dialogue in services. 
He reminded Members that Russia had taken commitments in 116 services sub-sectors, while the average figure for original WTO Members was 55. In its view, issues such as market access and 
domestic regulation had good prospects to be included in the post-Bali work program.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 27 - 
 
  3.128.  In Rules, the discussions were less advanced. Members needed to be more specific, if they 
wanted to reach the same level of maturity as in the three major pillars of the Round. Russia was seeking clarification and improvement of disci plines on anti-dumping and subsidies.  
3.129.  Finally, the development dimension of th e Round was of core importance. Members had 
made good progress at the High-Level Meeting on the LDC Services Waiver in February. This 
should serve as a good example when de aling with other elements of the DDA. 
3.130.  The representative of India associated her delegation with the statements made by Brazil 
on behalf of the G-20 and Indonesia on behalf of the G-33. She said that it was evident from the 
Chairs' reports that there had been active engagement in the past few weeks. There had been some new ideas and proposals presented, which had been discussed by Members. At the same time, it was evident that this renewed phase of engagement had not yielded concrete progress and 
the contours of the post-Bali work program still remained elusive.  
3.131.  She said it was imperative that Members diagnosed the present situation objectively, at 
the earliest, and sought answers to difficult ques tions that might enable them to move forward. 
First and foremost, Members needed to clear the strategic fog over the so-called "recalibration" in 
the ambition levels. In the view of her delegation, progress could be made only if Members seeking recalibration spelt it out in clear terms.  This had not been done thus far. Further, 
recalibration had to be vis-à-vis something. She asked what that benchmark was and whether 
there was a common understanding in this regard. 
3.132.  Another related question was whether the work already collectively undertaken by 
Members since the launch of the Round could be ignored. In this regard, she referred to the 
Ministerial mandates and the 2008 texts. She said that the existing texts had a sort of inherent 
balance and connectivity of issues. If that was disturbed in the name of recalibration, would Members start from a clean slate? If not, how would the elements of a package be identified 
without the possibility of cherry picking? India be lieved that the 2008 texts should be the basis for 
future work along with the Hong Kong Ministerial Decisions. She said that exploring different approaches was not tantamount to inverting the Ministerial mandates and the principles that 
guided the negotiating process in this Organization. 
3.133.  The Doha Round was a development round. It was therefore crucial that in the search for 
the right level of ambition in agriculture and other areas under negotiation, Members did not lose sight of the centrality of rebalancing inequiti es and of the principle of S&D treatment for 
developing countries. She said that any discussion on "doability", "recalibration" or "simplification" 
should not result in the dilution of the "development quotient" of this Round, as had been enshrined in the Ministerial decisions since the Doha Declaration.  
3.134.  Linked to this was the issue of higher co ntributions by some developing countries. She said 
that there appeared to be an attempt to make progress in the Round conditional upon the contributions by these Members, which were still developing countries and grappling with the 
challenges of large scale poverty, underdevelopment and inadequate access to the basic 
necessities of life. Differentiation among developing countries in this manner was unacceptable to India. Such arguments and conditionalities undermi ned the very basis of the negotiating function 
of the WTO which was premised on certain accepted principles, which did not allow for such 
differentiation. Any such attempt was bound to delay any movement towards a work program and 
eventually the conclusion of the Round. Contributions had to be benchmarked to levels of development rather than some vague sense of the world having changed.  
3.135.  India wished to have an early conclusion of the Round, but not at any cost and in any 
manner whatsoever. The conclusion had to de liver a meaningful development outcome. 
It appeared to her delegation that an atmosphere was already being created that if most of what 
the "recalibrators" wanted was not agreed to, the Round would be dead. December 2015 was 
being talked about as a de facto  deadline. India believed that this was a hasty characterization by 
those who were, perhaps, uncomfortable with the development dimension involving correction of the inequities in the international trading system, of which they were currently the beneficiaries. 
She said that there was still time until MC10. Rath er than delving in doomsday scenarios, it would 
be helpful to engage constructively and positively in addressing the issues most crucial to a successful conclusion of the Round.  TN/C/M/36 
 
- 28 - 
 
  3.136.  Agriculture remained central to any outcome in this Round. It had been India's consistent 
position, along with several other developing Members, that the level of ambition in this Round would be determined by agriculture. While her delegation remained engaged and was willing to redouble efforts to discuss all areas in an explor atory and "without prejudice" basis, meaningful 
engagement in other areas would have to await clarity on possible outcomes in agriculture. India 
believed that the Rev.4 text provided a good basis for work in agriculture. SP, SSM and a permanent solution on public stockholding for food security purposes had to be part of an outcome 
in MC10. India also had a deep interest in NAMA  and services, but active engagement in these 
areas would depend on the meaning of recalibration and how it would impact the core pillar of agriculture. 
3.137.  She said that Members needed to confront  these difficult questions together and provide 
credible answers in order to make progress towards credible outcomes. India was committed to 
working with Members in developing the post-Bali work program by July 2015 as well as advancing the discussion on all Ministerial Decisions. Going fo rward, it was clear that one would need to go 
beyond generalities and dig deeper into specifics to forge consensus on an "as close to full 
modalities" work program as had been indicate d by the Chairman. India believed that Members 
had a unique opportunity and an obligation to level th e playing field in this Round so that trade did 
deliver on development and poverty alleviation. Me mbers needed to strive for balanced outcomes 
keeping in mind the existing mandate and progress already achieved in the negotiations. Her delegation was mindful of the urgency, given that Members were only a few weeks from the July deadline. She said that India would not be found wanting in playing its part, along with other 
Members, as they continued to advance work in the weeks ahead.  
3.138.  The representative of Nigeria appreciate d the Chairman's untiring efforts and unwavering 
commitment to advancing work on the post-Bali wo rk program. As the clock was ticking, it was 
Nigeria's expectation that the work program would provide the necessary direction toward the 
successful conclusion of the Doha Round as well as a stepping stone with MC10 in mind. In that respect, Nigeria fully agreed with the Chairman that the work program had to be substantive and 
meaningful and should also provide guidance on how to conclude the DDA negotiations. In 
addition, Nigeria commended the Chairs of the vari ous negotiating groups for their hard work and 
their reports. In particular, his delegation had taken note of the sombre assessment of the state of play in the agriculture negotiation, which was li kely due to entrenched positions and divergent 
views on the domestic support and market access pillars, as correctly reported by the Chair of the 
CoA SS. Nigeria welcomed the Chairman's a ssessment and hoped that his three essential 
conclusions and overall assessment would serve as inspiration to all Members.  
3.139.  In view of the spectre of growing anxi ety by Members as the July deadline and MC10 
approached, his delegation wished to emphasize the following key points. First, while Nigeria supported the need to advance work in all areas, it noted that the progress achieved so far 
remained uneven both within and across the core areas of negotiations. Second, outcomes in 
agriculture as the centrepiece of the Doha Round were essential, especially to correct the existing imbalances. Members also needed to be mindful of the objective of the agriculture negotiation, which should be reflected in an outcome acro ss the three pillars. Therefore, the 2008 Rev.4 
revised draft modalities remained the basis for engagement. 
3.140.  Third, development, cotton and LDC issues had to remain central. In this regard, S&D 
treatment had to be an integral part of the variou s pillars of the negotiations. These were integral 
elements, not negotiating points to be traded an d measured against the overall balance. Fourth, 
the process of liberalization in services should take place with due respect for national objectives, level of development and the state of the econom ies of individual Members. Any complementary 
approach to the services negotiations had to be consistent with the current GATS architecture and 
agreed negotiating guidelines and procedures, including all the relevant instruments. Fifth, the Rules negotiation on fishery subsidies constituted a central element of the development component of the Doha Round given the critical importance of the sector to poverty reduction, 
livelihood and food security concerns of developing countries. Sixth, although the key market 
access issues were interlinked, Nigeria agreed that  sequencing would no longer be a viable option. 
Therefore, Members needed to be ready for horizontal negotiations, which should commence as 
soon as possible with clarity on the elements that were critical for success, overall balance and 
possible trade-offs. TN/C/M/36 
 
- 29 - 
 
  3.141.  Seventh, Nigeria recognized the need for all Members to make contributions consistent 
with the Doha mandate. It reiterated its call to Members, particularly the major players, to exercise the required flexibilities and political will so as to reach a successful outcome that would also guide the credibility and integrity of the Organization and the multilateral trading system. In 
spite of the difficult circumstances and challenges, Nigeria was hopeful that the path ahead was 
not insurmountable. It was important that Members collectively brought to bear the momentum from Bali and concluded a clearly developed work programme, addressing all the issues critical to 
the conclusion of the DDA, in parallel with the implementation of all Bali decisions, which was 
necessary to maintain the sense of urgency. 
3.142.  In conclusion, Nigeria remained willing and committed to working closely with all Members 
towards advancing the negotiation agenda, the post -Bali work program, MC10 and the subsequent 
successful conclusion of the DDA Work Programme. Nigeria supported the statements made by 
Lesotho on behalf of the African Group, Mali on be half of the C-4, Barbados on behalf of the ACP 
Group, Brazil on behalf of the G-20 and Indonesia on behalf of the G-33. 
3.143.  The representative of Mexico said that her delegation agreed that the work and 
consultations carried out over the previous weeks had been very useful. They had helped gain a 
better understanding of the problems faced in the negotiations and of the respective redlines. 
However, no substantial progress had been no ted, nor had there been a demonstration of 
leadership from those who should do so. There were a few months left until the end of July and, although this might seem to be enough time to put together the post-Bali work program, in order 
to do so Members had to make good use of this time. Mexico welcomed the call to the Chairs to 
intensify work in the various negotiating groups and, above all, the Chairman's intention to 
actively take charge of a horizontal process, such as that in Room W, which would help build trust amongst Members and explore avenues and possible trade-offs to find the much-needed formulas 
for consensus.  
3.144.  Mexico believed that there was an aspect around which most Members agreed: in order to 
successfully conclude the Round, they had to refine their focus. In this sense, Mexico agreed that 
the Rev.4 and Rev.3 documents offered key elements that should serve as the basis for 
negotiations. Nevertheless, it understood that there were elements that were not met with consensus. Therefore, consistent with its commitment to conclude the Doha Round and establish a realistic and credible work program, Mexico remained open to considering alternative approaches 
through which a doable and balanced result could be achieved.  
3.145.  In agriculture, an average tariff cut appr oach, as proposed by Paraguay, and recently by 
Norway, seemed to be viable and therefore it shou ld be explored. In export competition, Mexico 
joined others in pressing the need to eliminate all export subsidies. The work program should 
simply establish a date for their elimination. It should also establish as short a time-frame as possible for the repayment terms of export credits, paying particular attention to the specific 
sensitivities of some Members. Regarding food aid and state trading enterprises (STEs), Mexico 
believed that the commitments contained in Rev.4 were stable. In domestic support, Mexico advocated for substantial reductions and for avoiding the incorporation of trade-distorting support in the Green Box. It also considered it important to respect the OTDS concept and that all 
Members needed to make contributions. Mexico was ready to contribute to what was already 
outlined in Rev.4.  
3.146.  In NAMA, there seemed to be two options:  an average cut based on the application of the 
Swiss formula; or maintaining the formula, but recalibrating the coefficients. Both approaches had 
to be explored in depth, although the recalibration of coefficients was likely to be the most viable and balanced option.  
3.147.  In services, Mexico expected a market access result with commitments that substantially 
reduced the existing discrepancy between Members' bound levels under the GATS and applied levels. Results in market access had to be accompanied by disciplines in domestic regulation. This was not the case for GATS Rules, which Mexico believed should be part of a built-in agenda. 
Therefore, in services, the work program should contain the following: (i) the presentation of 
offers at the latest by September 2015; (ii) a period of intense negotiations based on offers that would allow Members to put forward final market  access commitments by December 2015 at the 
latest, with the legal scrubbing to be comple ted before the 2016 summer break; (iii) the re-TN/C/M/36 
 
- 30 - 
 
  initiation of negotiations on domestic regulation as soon as possible, based on the work carried out 
in 2011; (iv) and the GATS Rules component to be part of future work.  
3.148.  With regard to S&D treatment, it was clear that an intrinsic characteristic of the 
multilateral trading system was to give this kind of treatment broadly and as a matter of priority to 
those WTO Members that needed it the most. Therefore, Mexico hoped that in any discussion, this 
premise would be taken into account and translated into concrete results.  
3.149.  Mexico was ready to contribute to fully meeting the ministerial mandate of developing a 
post-Bali work program by July that would allow Members to achieve substantive and balanced 
results to the Doha Round at MC10.  
3.150.  The representative of Bangladesh, on behalf of the LDC Group, said that the Group 
attached great importance to the implementation of the Bali decisions. Unfortunately, progress had 
been rather slow. In some cases, there was no pr ogress at all. The Group reiterated its emphasis 
on and the importance of the effective and meaningf ul implementation of all Bali decisions relating 
to the LDCs. The Group was fully engaged in the form ulation and identification of the elements of a 
post-Bali work program. At the next General Council meeting, it might be able to make an 
elaborate statement on their issues of interest in the current phase of negotiations.  
3.151.  The representative of Hong Kong, China recalled that in the previous few months, 
informative sessions had been held to help Members understand better the negotiation contexts. 
There had been meetings in various configurat ions that had encouraged frank exchanges and 
concrete proposals meant to advance discussions. However, progress was not apparent and time was running out. Her delegation shared the Chairman's view that Members needed to see 
movement in all areas and should try to avoid any kind of de facto  sequencing. It was essential 
that Members pressed ahead with agriculture, NAMA  and services in tandem, so that they could 
see the full picture and work out horizontal trade-offs. Responding to calls to be realistic, many 
Members were already lowering their levels of ambition. The last thing Hong Kong, China wanted 
was to see some promising deliverables slip because they had been given attention at too late a stage to allow for a meaningful outcome. 
3.152.  Apart from the three core pillars, her delegation encouraged Members to make their 
interests in other elements of the DDA known, so as to speed up the dialogue. In this regard, Hong Kong, China indicated support for including Rules negotiations, in particular anti-dumping disciplines, in the post-Bali work program and hoped that substantive discussion could restart 
immediately. Meanwhile, her delegation remained constructively engaged in all areas of the 
negotiations and would try its best to contribute to the development of a doable work program for the satisfactory conclusion of the Doha Round.  
3.153.  The Trade Negotiations Committee took note of the statements.  
 
_______________ 
 
 TN/C/M/36 
 
- 31 - 
 
  ANNEX 
STATEMENT BY MALI ON BEHALF OF THE COTTON FOUR (C-4) 
AT THE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE IN SPECIAL SESSION ON 24 APRIL 2015 
Mr Chairman, the C-4 would like to thank you for organizing this meeting on cotton – the first 
for 2015 – and has taken note of your introductory remarks. 
We would also like to thank the WTO Secretariat for circulating the document summarizing the 
different mandates and decisions on cotton since the launching of the Sectoral Initiative in Favour 
of Cotton in 2003. 
For the C-4, the time has come to move on from the general statements and engage 
constructively in substantive discussions on the cotton issue. 
Mr Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, the General Council's decision of 27 November on Post-Bali 
work provides that all WTO Members shall engage co nstructively on the implementation of all Bali 
Ministerial Decisions in the relevant WTO bodies, and on the preparation of a clearly defined work programme on the remaining Doha Development Agenda issues. Members further agreed that "the 
issues of the Bali Package where legally binding outcomes could not be achieved, including LDC 
issues, shall be pursued on priority". These LDC issues include cotton. 
Consequently, the C-4 calls upon all stakeholders to engage actively in the efforts to find a solution 
to the cotton issue by the Tenth WTO Ministeria l Conference (MC-10) in accordance with the 
mandate of the Hong Kong Ministerial Conference and on the basis of the provisions of the Draft 
Modalities for Agriculture of 6 December 2008. 
To that end, the C-4 proposes the organization of technical meetings for substantive discussions, 
i.e. the development of working hypotheses on th e basis of the different mandates and decisions 
summarized by the Secretariat. 
Mr Chairman, specifically, the C-4 suggests an approach in three parts: 
a. Continuation of the two annual sessions of dedicated meetings of the 
Committee on Agriculture in Special Session on trade-related aspects of cotton which, 
in accordance with the Bali Ministerial Decision on Cotton, will help "to enhance 
transparency and monitoring in relation to the trade-related aspects of cotton" 
by examining, inter alia , relevant trade-related developments across the three pillars 
of: (i) Market Access, (ii) Domestic Support and (iii) Export Competition in relation to 
cotton. 
b. The organization, during the interval between the two bi-annual sessions, of 
intersessional meetings dedicated to technical negotiations on matters of substance 
in the quad or quad plus format or any other format deemed appropriate; 
c. On the basis of the above, resumption of the negotiations proper in the framework of the 
Committee on Agriculture in Special Session and the Sub-Committee on Cotton. 
Finally, Mr Chairman, the C-4 welcomes the informal consultations that you were kind enough to 
organize on 23 April 2015, in which all of the parties concerned by the cotton issue participated. 
In view of the frank discussions that took pl ace between the main stakeholders during these 
consultations, the C-4 urges Members that provided advance statistical data orally to transmit that 
data to the WTO Secretariat in writing, in as much detail as possible, in order to facilitate the transparency mechanism. 
Once again, the C-4 hopes that we can avoid, in our future discussions, becoming bogged down by 
any non-technical considerations so that we can truly concentrate on the development and 
consolidation of an acceptable solution to the cotton issue. Thank you. 
__________