ISLAMABAD,(March 20 2004): Pakistan along with other developing countries have urged developed countries to reduce subsidy and domestic support on agriculture products to resume the negotiations for early completion of Doha Development Agenda.

Officials at the commerce ministry told Dawn on Friday that the chairs of negotiating groups for the Doha agenda, which halted after the failure of Cancun ministerial conference in Mexico last year, were re-selected to resume the negotiations.

Pakistan was offered the chair of the special session of Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs), the officials said and added that being one of the chairs of the negotiating group meant that Pakistan would have far more influence on the negotiating process.

"We will be able to participate in all important meetings relating to Doha negotiations. Since there was no consensus on how to proceed on Singapore issues, no chairs were appointed. It seems that there could be no objection to negotiations on 'trade facilitation' but negotiations on other issues may not be agreed to," they remarked.

Since agriculture was considered as the key area, the first meeting of the negotiating group will be on agriculture, which was scheduled for March 22-26 in Geneva. Between these dates, WTO members were expected to have negotiations in small groups among themselves, the officials added.

There were hardly any significant commitments on reduction of trade distorting domestic support, elimination of export subsidies or any meaningful market access by the developed nations.

During the meeting, the officials said, the member countries would try to develop consensus on timetable and agenda for setting up of modalities for negotiations.

According to the officials, in case no sufficient progress was made in Doha agenda items, it was likely to postpone the 6th ministerial meeting scheduled to be held in Hong Kong in December this year.

The officials said that US trade representative Robert Zoellick had indicated during his recent meetings with the commerce minister that the US was willing to substantially reduce domestic subsidies on agriculture provided the EU also did the same.

He also expected developing countries to allow more market access through reducing their tariffs. On Singapore issues, he had agreed that during this round, negotiations should focus on trade facilitation and it should be made clear that other issues were not part of the single undertaking.

DAWN