Asian business and lobby groups on Monday welcomed a deal by rich and poor nations to move forward on slashing farm subsidies and opening industrial markets but warned the devil was in the details.
Business groups in Australia, Japan, India and New Zealand generally praised progress made by the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in setting guidelines for the Doha round that had been in doubt since talks collapsed in Mexico a year ago.
But the New Zealand Forest Industries Council seemed to sum up the mood of the region when it said a lot more detail needed to be worked out.
"We need to plug (the) gaps before we can declare this a success," Council Chief Executive Stephen Jacobi said.
While farm lobbies were pleased the deal would eliminate farm export subsidies, there was concern about the ground rules set for market access.
"The agreement contains mechanisms that we fear will allow countries to shield themselves from offering real and meaningful access to farmers," Australia's National Farmers' Federation President Peter Corish said in a statement.
"These mechanisms could potentially undermine superficial increases in market access," he said.
Australia is one of the world's largest agriculture exporters.
The WTO's 147 member states reached a deal at the weekend re-launching negotiations that hinge on key members, including the United States, the EU and Brazil and Japan, agreeing to eliminate farm export subsidies.
Agreement in the sensitive field of agriculture opened the way to outline accords in industrial goods trade, services and measures to boost the stake of poorer developing countries in world trade - seen as pivotal issues for the round.
"This is a good step. The WTO has been languishing now for nearly five years and it has been quite important for it to get back on the rails," trade analyst Alan Oxley told Australian television.
Australia has long pressed the European Union and the United States to roll back subsidies and give them greater access. The EU, in turn, accuses Australia of claiming to be a free trade champion while using strict quarantine laws to bar imports.
Australia and the United States signed a bilateral free trade deal in February, but the pact angered Australia's farm industry after it only gained reductions on beef exports over 18 years and a small increase in the dairy product exports duty free quota. New Zealand's Fonterra Co-operative Group, the world's largest exporter of dairy products, expressed disappointment at the lack of detail on market access but said the elimination of export subsidies was a substantial outcome.
"That is good news for dairy farmers and will be directly reflected in Fonterra's bottom line," said Fonterra Chairman Henry van der Heyden, whose company controls about one-third of the world's freely tradable dairy products.
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), a top industry lobby group, said the framework agreement would provide the much-needed boost the sagging Doha round needed.
"We are happy that the agreement drops the three contentious 'Singapore Issues' - investment, competition policy and Transparency in Government Procurement - from the Doha work programme," said CII President Sunil Kant Munjal.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard cautioned that there was a long way to go yet.
Comments
Comments are closed.