. /.  WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  TN/AG/20 
13 October 2005 
 (05-4667) 
Committee on Agriculture 
Special Session  
 
 
 
THIRTY-THIRD SPECIAL SESSION OF  THE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE 
 
Report by the Chairman, H.E. Ambassador Crawfo rd Falconer, to the Trade Negotiations Committee  
 
 
I. STATUS OF WORK 
1. The Special Sessions of the Committee on Agriculture are conducted under the Doha 
Ministerial Declaration (TN/C/M/1) and the Decision Adopted by the General Council on 
1 August 2004 (WT/L/579).  The thirty-third Special  Session was held on 13 September.  The agenda 
for the meeting was set out in Airgram WTO/AIR/2638 of 1 September 2005. 
2. The formal meeting confirmed my appointment as  Chairman of the Special Session following 
the decision of the General Council at its meeting on 29 July 2005.  After my appointment had been confirmed I made some general comments on the pr ocedure and process of the negotiations and some 
delegations responded.  My statement and the respon ses by delegations are reported in the Secretariat 
summary of the formal Special Session (TN/AG/R/21 of 7 October). 
3. During the days following the formal Speci al Session I held an intensive series of 
consultations with various Members and groups of Members.  From the responses I received from delegations to the questions I put to them at the form al meeting I felt that delegations were prepared to 
move to a more integrated approach which shoul d be increasingly informed by a sense of the numbers 
to be used in respect of reductions in support and protection.  I recognised that Members were clear 
that this needed to be a "botto m-up" process that was generated by, and had genuine buy in from, the 
whole Membership. 
4. Following the Agriculture Week held during the week beginning 12 September further 
informal open-ended consultations  were held on Friday, 30 Septem ber, Tuesday, 4 October and 
Friday, 7 October.  In addition, as I reported to Members at the open-ended meetings, I held several 
consultations with smalle r groups of delegations on issues, particularly those related to the market 
access and domestic support pillars of  the negotiations.  I was also present at a number of meetings 
organised by delegations on the export competition pillar as well as other aspects of the negotiations.  
I have put in place informal arrangements ("Clinics" ) to assist in the process of transparency and 
inclusiveness. TN/AG/20 
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II. OUTSTANDING ISSUES AND FURTHER WORK 
5. A successful Ministerial Conference in Hong Kong will require a considerable amount of 
work and progress in the very limited amount of time left.  While Members are clearly ready and willing to negotiate, and some of them  have shown that they are prepared to try to bridge differences 
in positions, a lot remains to be done to achieve mo dalities that will enable Me mbers to prepare their 
draft Schedules.  We have, this week, seen a very significant generation of momentum which has the 
potential to assist us in getting our work done.  The challenge now is to seize the opportunity 
presented.  The coming week or two will, in my vi ew, be crucial to creating the convergence we now 
need. 
6. In order to try to make as much progress as possible in the time available, I will be holding 
further open-ended informal consultations on Frid ay, 14 October, Tuesday, 18 October and Friday, 
21 October.  In addition, I will also be holding consultations with various  groups of delegations. 
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