Some delegations said they were disappointed with the lack of progress in the latest round of talks, which began on 7 February. Others said some of their consultations had been useful, and some repeated their call for issues that they have raised over the past months or years to be discussed seriously.

“We are losing one day every day,” the chairperson, who is New Zealand’s ambassador to the WTO, warned the membership. Negotiators face the targets of revising the 2008 draft “modalities” text by 21 April (before the Easter break), agreeing on texts in all Doha Round subjects by June or July, and concluding the round by the end of the year.

He compared the task of revising the draft modalities to landing an aeroplane, the time left until 21 April being the runway: “We’re looking to land the plane on the runway.” The task is “to get the plane on that runway and stopped before it [the runway] ends,” he said.

The plane should fly well with “bits and pieces of it not in danger of falling apart,” he added. (Audio below.)

Chairperson’s report

Amb.Walker briefed the full membership on consultations he held with a representative group of 38 members (“Room E” consultations, see below), the previous week, following a short opening meeting of the full membership on 7 February.

He said the group went through the “three pillars” of domestic support, market access, and export competition (ie, export subsidies and related issues).

In each case, the consultations covered: “bracketed or otherwise annotated” substance (ie, issues identified as unresolved) in the present (December 2008) draft “modalities” text and accompanying papers (see the chairperson’s 22 March 2010 report linked above), clarification of unclear parts of the present draft and questions about data, and other issues.

On substance, the “Room E” meetings produced little that was new, he said. However, he was aware that members were working among themselves on some subjects, including:

• tariff simplification (replacing complex forms of customs duties, with simpler forms, particularly percentages of the price)
• the special safeguard mechanism (SSM, allowing developing countries to raise tariffs temporarily to deal with price falls or import surges)
• tariff quota creation (which implies countries would be allowed to label products as “sensitive”, with a smaller than normal tariff cut, even if the products do not currently have tariff quotas)

He said members reported they were working on clarification and data issues and that some common understandings were beginning to emerge. But members had little to say on “other issues”, which he described as “a good thing”.

More generally, he also heard a number of delegations say that agriculture is no longer an issue to be treated in isolation because the question of how ambitious reforms should be is an issue that cuts across several subjects.

Members’ comments

Some members agreed that the various forms of consultations had been useful, and that work on data and clarifying ambiguities in the present draft is essential. Some said the Room E meetings were disappointing.

Some repeated their concerns that some of the issues they had raised had not been discussed in depth.

Some delegations said issues that are more or less settled should not be re-opened because that could unravel the whole agricultural package. Another said “nothing is fixed, nothing is untouchable”.

Some repeated their call for countries to open their agricultural markets more, to match the pressure on developing countries to open their non-agricultural and services markets.

Some said the focus should be to remove square brackets (settle issues where countries still disagree), so that when ministers receive the draft “modalities” they have only a few straightforward questions to deal with.

Room E

The chairperson held consultations with 38 delegations, representing all the main coalitions. This is a configuration used from time to time to allow a freer discussion that can then feed into the “multilateral” process involving all members, in a structure sometimes called “concentric circles”.

The 38 delegations invited were: Argentina (Cairns Group, G-20), Australia (Cairns Group coordinator), Brazil (G-20 coordinator, also Cairns), Burkina Faso (Cotton-4 coordinator, also African Group, least-developed, Africa-Caribbean-Pacific), Canada (Cairns), Chile (Cairns), China (G-33, G-20, recent new member), Colombia (Cairns, tropical products group), Costa Rica (tropical products coordinator, also Cairns), Cuba (G-33, G-20, small and vulnerable economies, ACP), Dominican Rep (small-vulnerable economies coordinator, also G-33), Ecuador (tropical products, recent new member), Egypt (African Group agriculture coordinator, G-20), EU, Gabon (African Group, ACP), India (G-33, G-20), Indonesia (G-33 coordinator, also G-20, Cairns), Jamaica (ACP, also G-33, small-vulnerable), Japan (G-10), Kenya (African Group coordinator, also G-33, ACP, Commodities Group), Rep. Korea (G-33, G-10), Malaysia (Cairns), Mauritius (ACP coordinator, G-33, African), Mexico (G-20), New Zealand (Cairns), Norway (G-10), Pakistan (Cairns, G-20, G-33), Paraguay (Cairns, G-20, tropical products, small-vulnerable), Philippines (G-33, G-20, Cairns), South Africa (Cairns Group, African Group, ACP), Switzerland (G-10 coordinator), Chinese Taipei (recent new members coordinator, also G–10), Thailand (Cairns, G-20), Turkey (G-33), Uruguay (Cairns, G-20), US, Venezuela (G-33, G-20), Zambia (least-developed countries coordinator, also African Group, ACP)

Audio

Use these links to download the audio files or to listen to what he said in the meeting:

The chair's statements:

Explanations

This meeting

This was an informal agriculture negotiations meeting of the full membership, officially an “Informal Open-Ended Special Session” of the Agriculture Committee.

The latest texts and a number of related issues can be found with explanations here, including what “the text” is and says, and a “jargon buster”.

The current phase of the negotiations is about “modalities”, explained here.

Outstanding issues

Chairperson David Walker describes the issues he is currently dealing with as topics that are “bracketed and otherwise annotated” in the 2008 documents. He listed these issues and his assessments in his 22 March 2010 report to the Trade Negotiations Committee.

From templates and data, to commitments

Templates: Here, these are blank forms prepared for the “schedules” (lists or tables) of commitments, and for data used to calculate the commitments. Some of the data will be in “supporting tables” attached to the schedules of commitments.

Part of the technical work is on organizing the data. Electronic forms or tables will be used to present base data — data to be used as the starting point for calculating commitments — in a way that is transparent and verifiable. Eventually they will be used to design “templates” for how the commitments will be presented.

Among the data needed are domestic consumption, for calculating the tariff quotas on sensitive products, and values of production for calculating domestic support commitments.

The technical work follows the draft “modalities” text of December 2008 and takes negotiators through the following sequence:

1. Members identify data needs and design blank forms (“templates”) for data and for commitments.

This is in two steps:

• Step 1: considering what “base data” are needed under the present draft “modalities” — what is already available, what will need to be “constructed”, and whether the draft “modalities” says how this should be done. This step also includes the question of whether supporting tables — tables displaying the data and how they are derived — are needed and what their format would be.
   
• Step 2: developed from step 1, designing “templates” or blank forms to be used for the commitments resulting from the Doha Round negotiations, and for any supporting data required. Parts of the data could be presented before, during or after “modalities” have been agreed.

(Chairperson Walker has also referred to an eventual step 3: filling in the numbers.)

2. “Modalities” (formulas, flexibilities, disciplines) agreed, perhaps with agreed blank forms or tables, and with some data attached.

3. “Scheduling” — forms/tables filled in. Some are draft commitments, based on “modalities” formulas. Some are supporting tables of data.

4. Members verify each others’ draft commitments, using the supporting data.

5. Commitments are agreed as part of the Doha Round single undertaking.

This work is technical, but some political questions also still have to be sorted out before “modalities” can be agreed.