New draft texts on agriculture and industry are a step forward in world trade talks but the range of tariff and subsidy cuts they propose are too tough, European Union Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said.
In an interview with Spain's el Economista newspaper on Saturday, Mandelson said the lower end of the proposed range of cuts would not really help the World Trade Organisation reach a free trade agreement.
"The top ends of the ranges are too ambitious and the lowest are not enough to make sure the negotiations result in satisfactory liberalisation," Mandelson was quoted as saying. The drafts proposed this week say the EU should cut its highest agricultural import tariffs by 73 percent against its offer of 60 percent.
WTO mediators also proposed that US farm subsidies be capped at between $13 billion and $16.4 billion, compared with the $17 billion Washington has offered. Most developing nations would have industrial goods import tariffs of 12 percent on average, much lower than the ceiling countries such as Brazil and India have sought, while developed countries would cut tariffs to below 3 percent on average.
"I will have to negotiate hard to defend Europe's interests," Mandelson said. "They (the texts) have helped put pressure on all of us but we have to keep calm."
Mandelson, who met Brazil's Foreign Minister Celso Amorim this week, said he saw signs that Latin America's largest economy wanted to reach a deal but added that, with US elections looming, time was ticking for the talks. "We must get our positions to converge in the autumn or there's no way we'll manage it for a few years," he said.
The Doha round of trade talks was launched in Qatar in 2001 in a bid to restore confidence in the world economy and prioritise the development of poor countries but the talks have been mired in one set of problems after another.
Mandelson also warned against any corporate protectionism after German Chancellor Angela Merkel proposed that Europe should look at ways of protecting companies from potentially politically motivated foreign funds. "It worries me that the EU might give the image of closing itself to foreign investment," Mandelson said.
"We should protect our strategic sectors, but intelligently. Thinking aloud, I wonder if we could create a 'European golden share' that would be managed by national governments and the European Commission," he added. "If we leave it in the hands of each national government, it will be used simply to protect national interests."
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