Just as at the same time last year, Supachai Panitchpakdi, head of the World Trade Organization (WTO), is again making use of every opportunity to call on the bloc's members for more efforts and compromise in the new round of multilateral trade talks.

But the words and feelings are quite different from those of last year.

"At the latest by March (2005), we should be able to determine the work program that will set concrete targets for the Hong Kong ministerial," he said in the past days very often and optimistic.

A consensus expected to reach at the 148-member body's ministerial meeting in Hong Kong, China next December will mean a new global trade deal by 2006.

The negotiations, which started in Doha, Qatar, in 2001 and aimed to slash subsidies, tariffs and other barriers to global commerce, is the first round of trade talks launched by the WTO since its foundation in 1995.

As time goes on, hope and expectation has replaced anxiety and dismay brought by the failure of the ministerial meeting in September 2003 in Cancun, Mexico.

The change came after some breakthroughs were reached on key issues and the approval of a framework agreement at the WTO's Geneva headquarters on Aug. 1 this year, which successfully brought the so-called Doha round trade talks back on track.

FRAMEWORK AGREEMENT: HISTORIC FOR WTO

"This is a historic moment for this organization," Supachai said at a press conference after WTO members reached the framework agreement, which is a key step taken towards the conclusion of the Doha round trade talks.

No wonder the WTO chief made such remarks. In those days when negotiations were trapped in stalemate, people were losing confidence not only in the multilateral trade system but also in the world trade body itself.

The framework accord put the trade talks back on track, nearly 11 months after trade ministers failed to reach such an accord in Cancun.

The Cancun ministerial meeting's collapse was mainly due to sharp divergence between developed and developing members over agricultural subsidies.

AGRICULTURE: TOUGHEST ISSUE

The framework agreement was reached soon after rich members agreed to lower their subsidies for farm products, the toughest issue of the Doha Round.

The European Union, the United States, Japan and some other developed members also agreed to eliminate export subsidies, at a date yet to be set, and to limit other subsidies and lower tariff barriers.

The steps were taken after developing members denounced for years the developed ones for their yearly spending of 300 billion US dollars in subsidies to protect their agricultural producers

from cheap imports.

Cotton subsidies are another hard nut to crack.

African countries have always been pressing the United States, the world's second-largest cotton grower and largest exporter, to remove government subsidies on the cotton sector, which they said have caused artificially low international prices and hurt farmers in developing countries.

The African countries, whose economies largely depend on cotton products and exports, demanded the WTO separate this issue from overall agricultural negotiations so that it can receive great and specific concern. But their demand was rejected by the United States.

Both the two parties made compromise before the latest framework agreement was reached. The United States agreed to start negotiation on cotton subsidies, while the African countries accepted the idea of setting up a subcommittee within the agricultural talks to deal with this issue.

TRADE FACILITATION: NEW NEGOTIATING AREA

Trade facilitation, which means to simplify and harmonize trade procedures, is a totally new area added up to the Doha round talks this year.

The consensus on launching negotiations on trade facilitation finally came after years of disputes between the WTO's developed members and the developing ones.

Study on the issue of trade facilitation -- together with three other issues -- started in as early as 1996 when trade ministers met in Singapore. Therefore, the four issues are called "Singapore issues."

Difference on whether to include the Singapore issues into the current round of negotiations was one of the major points at the Doha ministerial meeting in 2001, and the last straw that caused the failure of the Cancun ministerial meeting in 2003.

After putting trade facilitation on the negotiation agenda this summer, the WTO has convened two meetings and worked out a plan for future negotiations in this aspect.

Source: Xinhua