African, Caribbean, Pacific bloc seeks 'fully multilateral' global trade
by Jean-Marc Poche
Monday, July 12, 2004
GRAND BAY, Mauritius (AFP): Trade ministers
from African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries worked Saturday to hammer
out a joint position on global trade to protect their mainly agriculture-based
economies in hard-ball negotiations with the world's most powerful nations.
The one-day meet in this northern resort town comes a day before the Indian
Ocean island nation hosts a larger G90 meeting, and only weeks ahead of a
fresh bid by the World Trade Organization (WTO) to move past its failed summit
last year. "The Doha (trade round) process
must be fully multilateral and the ACP grouping is ready to contribute to such
a process in order to find consensus in July", said acting Mauritian prime
minister Maurice Jayen Cuttaree. "We must
make sure that these negotiations will lead to fair and equitable results. A
multilateral trade system which is efficient and balanced is in the interest
of all (ACP) members", Jayen Cuttaree said.
The WTO's so-called Doha Round of trade liberalization talks collapsed in
Cancun, Mexico last September, partly because of disagreement over massive
agricultural subsidies doled out to producers in the European Union and United
States. The 79 countries in the ACP, which
benefits from some privileged trade ties to the European Union, are expected
Sunday to update a joint declaration issued ahead of the Cancun talks.
That position calls on the world's richest countries to slash tariffs and
export subsidies while ensuring market access for ACP nations' exports,
primarily agricultural products and textiles.
Jayen Cuttaree underlined the need to maintain the APC's pursuit of fair trade
deals between rich and poor countries in the Doha round, named after an
initial set of talks held in the Qatari capital three years ago.
"It is especially indispensable for weak and vulnerable developing countries
like our own, whose economic pull in the world is very weak", he said.
"The big developed countries can negotiate bilateral deals and seal free trade
agreements and choose their partners. We don't have this possibility. Only a
well-regulated trade system can protect the rights of small economies", he
added. The APC's 35 ministers and some 200
delegates in Grand Bay are to be joined in Mauritius on Monday by other
members of the G90, which includes the ACP states, the African Union and a
bloc of the world's least developed nations.
WTO talks were also scheduled to pick up where Cancun left off next week but
have been delayed. No new date has been announced.
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