WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONWT/MIN(03)/ST/85
11 September 2003
(03-4854)
MINISTERIAL CONFERENCE
Fifth Session
Cancún, 10 - 14 September 2003Original:  English
MOROCCO
Statement by H.E. Mr Mustapha Mechahouri
Minister of Foreign Trade
I should like, in my own name on behalf of the Moroccan delegation, to express my sincerest
thanks to the Government and people of Mexico for organizing this Fifth Ministerial Conference of
the WTO, and for their warm welcome and the hospitality they have shown us since our arrival in thisbeautiful country.
Our thanks go also to the Director-General of the WTO and to all the members of the WTO
Secretariat for the efforts they have made since th e launching of the Doha Round and will continue to
make during this Conference.
True to its tradition, the World Trade Organiza tion has invariably succeeded in taking the
right initiative at the right time in order to relaunch multilateral negotiations.  We have observed this
during the Uruguay Round, before Singapore and here at Cancún.  I should like to pay tribute to it on
that account.
Allow me to recall that the Doha Conference allo wed us to launch a round of negotiations that
enjoyed the support of all Members.  The Doha Round established an ambitious work programme to
further reinforce the multilateral trade system on the basis of a comprehensive and balanced approach
which reflects the legitimate interests of all the Members of the WTO and includes the "development"
dimension as a fundamental component of all the negotiations.
Under the Doha Ministerial Declaration we are required, in the course of these few days at
Cancún, to take stock of progress, to provide any necessary guidance for the relaunching of the
Doha Programme and to take decisions as necessary for the completion of the negotiating round
within the prescribed time-limits.
The work undertaken so far in Geneva has enabled progress to be made in nearly all areas of
the negotiations.  But we have not succeeded in reflecting that progress in concrete and binding
commitments.  Although th e implications of the negotiations are better understood, no consensus has
been reached on their modalities.
In order to capitalize on the considerable efforts made so far, Morocco is in favour of the
approach whereby general frameworks would be adop ted setting out the elements of the modalities.
In our view, such an approach should allow headway to be made in our future work.  That, as we see
it, is the ultimate objective of the Cancún Conference.
Previous speakers have presented interesting approaches to addressing the issues before us.
For my part, I shall merely explain the position of the Kingdom of Morocco in terms of developmentsto date in the Doha process.WT/MIN(03)/ST/85
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First, Morocco welcomes the recent agreement on TRIPS and Public Health.  That
achievement, to which Morocco made a significant contribution as coordinator of the countries of the
African Group, is a historic one.  It has accordingly lent historic dimension to the Doha Round and
will undoubtedly give fresh impetus to our negotiations.
With regard to special and differential treatment, we take stock of progress made on this issue
and hope that the negotiations will speed up in order to make this an instrument for integrating the
developing countries and the least-developed countries into world trade.
Regarding the negotiations on agriculture, we note that there has been some satisfactory
progress.  We will need to ensure, however, that there is no lowering of the level of ambition set atDoha.  Furthermore, there will have to be significant reductions in domestic support and export
subsidies particularly in respect of horticultural products.  We express our solidarity, in this context,
with the four countries of Central Africa which have tabled an initiative in favour of cotton and we
launch an appeal for their legitimate request to be taken into account here, at Cancún.
The developing countries should, moreover, be granted greater flexibility in the various areas
of the negotiations to enable them to meet their development objectives as far as is possible,
particularly those pertaining to rural development and food security.
Regarding market access for non-agricultural products, Morocco is in favour of a formula-
based approach, covering all products without exception, which does not penalize developing
countries that have made the effort to reach high levels of bindings, and of which special and
differential treatment is an essential component.
Furthermore, participation in the supplementar y approaches should be voluntary in order to
achieve reductions over and above those obtained through the core modalities.
Morocco is also in favour of taking into acco unt the erosion of preferences that would follow
the tariff reductions implemented as a result of the negotiations, and accordingly invites the
negotiating group to examine the problem thoroughly with a view to developing an appropriate
mechanism to address the situation.
The negotiations on trade in services appear to be following the course charted for them by
the Doha Declaration.  For its part, Morocco has participated actively in the bilateral consultations and
provided all the clarifications requested.  However, a balance must be found between the rights and
obligations of Members within the framework of th e General Agreement on Trade in Services in order
to ensure better access for the exports of developing countries to the markets of developed countries,inter alia  by further liberalizing the conditions governing the movement of natural persons in these
countries.
With regard to the negotiations on WTO rules, in Morocco's view it is necessary to preserve
the effectiveness of implementing the disciplines governing anti-dumping and countervailingmeasures, as a means of countering harmful unfair trade practices.  The results of these negotiations,
which must be limited to clarifying and improving existing rules, should not be reflected as a
reduction in the right of Members to resort to remedial trade measures.
With regard to the discussions on the rules applying to regional trade agreements, Morocco is
satisfied with the progress made in the negotiations on procedural matters, the aim of which is to
make regional trade agreements more transparent.  In our view, however, it is time we embarked on
negotiations on systemic issues in order to clarify and improve the relevant multilateral disciplines.WT/MIN(03)/ST/85
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On the subject of trade and environment, Morocco takes note of the progress made in
determining concepts and definitions for the terms contained in the mandate for these negotiations.
The negotiations on environment provide an opportunity for Members to make good the
multilateral trade system's shortcomings in the area of trade and environment, but without using themas an opportunity to restrict market access for exports, particularly those from developing countries.
With regard to the Singapore Issues, Morocco is in favour of commencing the negotiations.
We hope that the future multilateral agreements on investment, competition, government
procurement, and trade facilitation will be sufficiently flexible to accommodate the particularities of
developing countries and their development needs.  Morocco furthermore calls for technical
assistance to be reinforced, in particular by strengthening human and institutional capacities so as toenable the developing countries to negotiate these future agreements on the best possible footing and
to use their implementation as a tool for economic development.
That is Morocco's overall appraisal of the status of the negotiations.  It now remains for us to
set the course for our future work in order to give new momentum to the Doha Round.
To that end, we propose three courses of action for consideration, to which the
Cancún Conference should make political commitments.
First, we must reiterate our attachment to the Doha Programme as a whole and reaffirm that
the "development" dimension is its cornerstone.  We must ensure that this commitment is likewise
observed by our negotiators in Geneva, the political and the technical components being
complementary and essential to progress in the negotiations.
The second course of action concerns the approach to be adopted in implementing the
Doha Programme.  The hallmark of this Round is that it is a single undertaking, and it is therefore
necessary to establish a positive link between the various areas of the negotiations so that it is possible
to move ahead without having to wait for certain Members to progress on a given issue before others
can advance elsewhere.
The third - but by no means the least important - course of action consists in adopting early
results on certain priority issues.  Issues are, of course, ranked differently depending on the social andeconomic objectives of Members, but it is necessary to send out clear signals in order to boost the
public confidence worldwide in the Doha Round of ne gotiations, particularly in the developing and
the least-developed countries.  Such results would be bound to give a new stimulus to the
implementation of the Doha Programme and to the continuation of the negotiations with a view to
their completion by 1 January 2005.
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