Time running out for Doha

The current round of trade negotiations -- the sixth World Trade Organization ministerial meeting -- in Hong Kong, which are shaped by the development agenda set at Doha in 2001, hang in the balance.

After collapsed talks in Seattle in 1999 and Cancun in September 2003, people are naturally asking questions, uneasy and even pessimistic about the future of the WTO.

The mood, however, would not be so gloomy if both developed and developing countries entered the talks with good faith to strengthen the multilateral trading system, which was established by the Uruguay Round of 1994. After all, the negotiations have already come a long way since Doha.

Cancun, though it ended prematurely, helped set the agenda, which consists of agriculture, non-agricultural market access, services, trade facilitation rules and development-related issues.

The WTO 148 member countries finally agreed on a framework last July 2004. Most important to the interests of developing countries such as Indonesia is the agreement on a specific framework of formulas for reducing export subsidies, domestic support and import barriers in agricultural commodities, which will be translated into final modalities at the current ministerial meeting in Hong Kong.

The other top priority agenda in Hong Kong is the general agreement on trade in services and non-agricultural market access.

To his credit, President George Bush, with his fast-track authority for trade talks, which will expire in mid-2007, has been pushing hard for trade liberalization. U.S. trade negotiators recently proposed that the highest U.S. tariffs on farm produce be cut by 90 percent and the most trade-distorting subsidies by 60 percent. The biggest problem is the European Union, which still seems to be dragging its feet, offering farm tariff cuts by an average of less than 40 percent.

Now, the ministers meeting in Hong Kong at least have a clearer idea of where they want this round to go. What they must do is remove the mutual distrust that built up after the ministerial meeting in Seattle in 1999 and set forth a sound basis for the liberalization negotiations that will take place thereafter.

While the liberalization of world farm trade is very important and vital to the interests of poor countries, the Hong Kong meeting should not allow the farm trade issue to hijack the whole WTO negotiating round.

True, phasing out subsidies for food produce in major industrialized countries is crucial for the programs in Indonesia and other developing countries to achieve food security. The continued dumping of food commodities by the rich nations not only distorts trade but could eventually destroy food crop farming in poor countries and force them to depend, dangerously, on food imports from rich nations.

But the developing countries, especially Indonesia -- the world's fourth most populous country in the world -- should also take into account not only their farm producers but also their farm consumers.

Moreover, Indonesia, a leader of the Group of 33 developing countries within the WTO negotiations, should be aware that it is mostly the poor nations that need a multilateral trading system.

Time is running out for the Doha round. If Doha collapses, there will be bitter times ahead for free-traders the world over. Bilateral deals and regional free trade arrangements may seem faster, but while they may have a role to play, they are far more limiting. This calls for the willingness of all parties to realize that "You can't win 'em all" indeed, "you win some, you lose some".

Only multilateral discussions can deliver the substantive trade liberalization of politically sensitive items that is needed to bring about the necessary structural adjustments for growth and development. Trying to resolve trade issues on a bilateral basis is certainly not advantageous for Indonesia and other poor countries with weak bargaining positions.

Whatever the final outcome of the WTO meeting in Hong Kong, the most fundamental agenda for Indonesia remains: Strengthening the market competitiveness of our farm produce through an integrated development approach encompassing the propagation of high-yield varieties, technical extension services for farmers, better irrigation networks and rural infrastructure and easy credit financing.

All these measures have been encompassed in the agricultural revitalization program President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono launched last July. What is still acutely lacking is inter- ministerial coordination to execute the program.