G-20 to adopt new agri strategy on market access
By Sajid Chaudhry
ISLAMABAD: The European Union’s proposal relating to market access in agriculture for developed and developing countries under the WTO ongoing negotiations has compelled the G-20 to adopt a new strategy to safeguard their interests in the ministerial meeting of G-20 to be held at Bhurban, Pakistan, an official at the Ministry of Commerce told Daily Times on Saturday.
The G-20 has a wide and balanced geographical representation and consists currently of 20 member countries: 5 from Africa (Egypt, Nigeria, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe), 6 from Asia (China, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Philippines and Thailand) and 9 from Latin America (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Cuba, Mexico, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela).
The G-20 countries are hoping to discuss their further strategy at the next ministerial meeting from 8 to10 September.
The official said that Pakistan’s Permanent Mission at the World Trade Organization (WTO) Geneva, in a latest communication, has informed the M\ministry that, considering that of the three pillars of agricultural, there had been no progress on market access during July. An effort was made to reach some understanding on the basic structure of a tariff reduction formula. Although it was agreed at the
Dalian Ministerial that the G-20 proposal for market access will be considered as a basis for further negotiations, the EU proposed a substantially different structure.
Their proposal was to have three tiers for developed as well as developing countries. In the case of developed countries, these tiers would be zero to 20% 20% to 100% and above 100%. For developing countries, these tiers would be 0-30% 30-150% and above 150%. \
Furthermore, within each tier, the EU proposed a flexibility of 20%. For example, if it was agreed to have a 10% cut on a certain band, the EU proposal would mean that varying cuts form 8 to 12% could be applied on individual tariff lines, as long as all cuts within the band average out to 10%.
Therefore, they are not only asking for flexibility for sensitive products, they are also seeking double flexibility for other products. Additionally, they want to have the same number of bands for developing as well as developed countries.
Furthermore, the G-10 countries insisted that they could not agree to any tariff ceiling which the G-20 had proposed at 100% for developed countries and 150% for developing countries.
These proposals by the EU and the G-10 were neither acceptable to the G-20 nor to the US. Therefore, no movement was seen on market access negotiations in agriculture in the month of July.