Operationalising the Doha Development Round
At the Doha Ministerial Conference in November 2001, WTO members agreed to a new round of trade negotiations that would place the needs and interests of developing countries at the heart of the work programme, in particular, ensuring that the agreements promote development in poor countries. Thus the Doha Round aims to lower barriers to trade around the world with a particular focus on making trade fairer for developing countries.
The Doha Round of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiations remains the greatest opportunity for developing countries to achieve fairer global trade.
The Commonwealth Secretariat's work seeks to operationalise the Doha Round and thereby implements projects with the aim of enhancing small states' and LDCs' ability to formulate, manage and implement trade policies at national, regional and multilateral levels and to benefit from them.
The Secretariat provides technical and analytical support to Commonwealth developing countries on a wide range of issues under the Doha Development Round negotiations, particularly in areas of interest to them.
The WTO has the potential to create a level playing field and fair terms for the relatively disadvantaged of its 148 members and countries in the process of accession. The Doha Round could enhance the benefits to developing countries from world trade through the following:
Market Access Negotiations
- A commitment by developed countries to increase market access for their goods and services into developed country markets, taking into account the negative effects of MFN tariff liberalisation on existing margins of preference for products currently enjoying preferential treatment;
- A commitment by developed countries to reduce, with a view to eliminating, export subsidies applied to products of export interest to developing countries, taking into account the potential negative affect on net-food importing countries;
- A commitment by developed countries to substantially reduce their overall levels of domestic support for products of export interest to developing countries;
- Problems related to Rules of Origin as well as Sanitary and Phytosanitary Standards should be addressed to enable the EU's Everything But Arms and the USA's Africa Growth and Opportunity Act initiatives to be more effective. There is a need to move to a harmonised set of rules of origin and standards.
Services
- Greater commitment by developed countries to services liberalisation in low-skilled labour intensive services sectors construction, shipping services and health services) and in particular, temporary movement of natural persons (GATS Mode 4).
More importantly, a 'truly developmental' round can be achieved through an agreement by developed countries, at this round of negotiations, to operationalise and provide to developing countries effective and meaningful special and differential treatment commitments on each of the issues negotiated. There is also a need to establish a finance adjustment mechanism, provided in tandem with the WTO negotiations, to assist developing countries, particularly small states that incur adjustment costs arising from multilateral trade liberalisation. Such a facility would compensate the relatively small number of countries which will suffer disproportionate economic harm, thus relieving protectionist pressures in the WTO's poorer member states and lessening frictions in the current round of multilateral trade negotiations.
The Commonwealth seeks to mobilise resources to meet its members' needs with greater urgency and to take advantage of the opportunities coming from the renewed commitment to move negotiations forward.