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FTAA Talks Enter 'Last Stage,' Trade Officials Say After Meetings
(Wednesday, April 16, 2003 -- CropChoice news) -- John Nagel, Bureau of National Affairs: PUEBLA, Mexico--Following talks that mark the "last stage" toward
reaching a hemisphere-wide Free Trade Area of the Americas, negotiators
from 34 nations were instructed to intensify talks on agricultural
issues and develop a plan for seeking assistance for poorer nations
making the transition to liberalized trade, the co-presidents of the
FTAA Trade Negotiations Committee said April 11.
The FTAA Trade Negotiations Committee is made of up deputy trade
ministers from the 34 Western Hemisphere democracies participating in
FTAA talks. A goal set at the December 1994 Summit of the Americas in
Miami was to conclude negotiations toward the FTAA by Jan. 1, 2005.
The Trade Negotiations Committee is co-chaired by Peter Allgeier,
deputy U.S. Trade Representative, and Clodoaldo Hugueney, Brazil's
undersecretary general for integration, economic & foreign trade issues.
Alluding to the latest round of talks in Puebla in a news conference,
Allgeier said, "This really marks the last stage of the negotiations
toward the FTAA. We reviewed the entire range of issues," including
market access, the text of the agreement, assistance to poor nations and
greater participation of civil society in the FTAA process, he said.
The Trade Negotiations Committee, which oversees negotiations between
FTAA ministerial meetings, met the week of April 7 at the headquarters
of the FTAA Secretariat in Puebla.
The next meeting of the Trade Negotiations Committee starts July 7 in
El Salvador. The next FTAA ministerial meeting takes place Nov. 20-21 in
Miami.
Agriculture, Market Access Issues
The Trade Negotiations Committee reached an "important understanding"
in meetings on market access and the sensitive issue of agriculture
trade, Hugueney said.
"We arrived at an understanding that preserves all the previous
decisions on the need to talk about all the agricultural themes here, in
the FTAA and in the context of the hemisphere. But also, the
negotiations seek to find new alternatives for dealing with
[agricultural] questions that permit compatibility with what happens in
Geneva and in the Doha Round and what is done here in the FTAA. I think
that the result on agriculture is a good result, but it is not a final
result. It is a result that gives more space for advancing the
agricultural negotiations of the FTAA," Hugueney said.
The Trade Negotiations Committee instructed the FTAA's Negotiating
Group on Agriculture to "intensify its discussions on all issues on its
agenda, in particular those related to export subsidies and to all other
practices that distort trade in agriculture products, including those
that have an equivalent effect to agriculture export subsidies, without
any exceptions and without prejudging the outcome," guidance issued to
negotiators said.
Allgeier said that FTAA negotiators "agreed that [agriculture] is a key
issue in [FTAA] negotiations and in the World Trade Organization, and as
evidence of that [the United States] has made what I think is
indisputably the most ambitious proposal before the WTO on agriculture,"
which includes the elimination of export subsidies, decreases in other
domestic support subsidies, and the opening of markets by reducing
tariffs, and eliminating other barriers to agricultural trade.
No Product Excluded
On the issue of FTAA market access, Allgeier noted that the
presentation of tariff elimination offers from all FTAA nations Feb. 15
was an "important milestone" for the FTAA.
Allgeier noted that "there is no product excluded from our offers, no
agricultural product, no industrial product. We have said that we would
put everything on the negotiating table, and on February 15 we put
everything on the negotiating table regarding tariffs."
Allgeier and Hugueney said that the Trade Negotiations Committee
provided important guidance that will assist in counteroffers being
presented by FTAA negotiators by June 15, including harmonization of
base tariffs and harmonization of initial offers that may have been
expressed in different nomenclatures.
Revised tariff phase-out offers are to be presented "to the extent
possible, on the basis of the Harmonized System 2002," instructions
issued to negotiators said.
"We are working on this presentation of initial offers. Everything is
very advanced in this context," Hugueney added.
Text of Agreement to Take Shape
Negotiators also received instructions outlining the development of the
text of the FTAA.
The Trade Negotiations Committee "recognizes the need to design an
overall structure of the agreement and to harmonize the formats of the
individual chapters," guidance issued to negotiators said.
The Trade Negotiations Committee instructed the Technical Committee on
Institutional Issues "to develop a proposed architectural framework for
the agreement" to be submitted for review.
The Technical Committee on Institutional Issues was also instructed "to
prepare a template for the draft chapters" for submission at July
meetings. Draft chapters will be submitted to the Trade Negotiating
Committee eight weeks prior to the Miami ministerial.
Technical, Other Assistance to Poorer Nations
A key issue for negotiators in the Puebla talks was the issue of the
differences in the levels of economic development of the 34 countries
participating in FTAA talks, Allgeier said.
He said that technical assistance for less developed nations were
discussed "at length."
"We have among the richest economies of the world and some of the
poorer counties of the world, and somehow we have to find an agreement
that will mean something positive for each of those countries, and that
is the biggest challenge that we have. So we talked at length about
that, and we talked about implementing a program of technical assistance
in these countries," Allgeier said.
Assistance to poorer nations in some cases could take the form of fast
tariff phase-outs. The United States in February offered particularly
quick elimination of tariffs from the poorest countries in the
hemisphere, Allgeier said.
The FTAA's Consultative Group on Smaller Economies was instructed to
develop an action plan for future meetings that will include development
and financial officials, international financial institutions,
international agencies, and interested private entities to discuss
"financing and implementation" of measures to assist poorer nations.
Poor countries are making up a list of priorities that they will
present in meetings with representatives of institutions, including the
U.S. Agency for International Development and the Inter-American
Development Bank, to discuss "what sort of assistance will be
forthcoming," Allgeier said.
The Trade Negotiations Committee also gave instructions to increase the
transparency of the FTAA process by holding a series of meetings
throughout the hemisphere between government officials and
representatives of civil society, Allgeier and Hugueney said.
Among other measures, the FTAA is improving its Web site and issuing
public statements following meetings, the officials said.
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