Attempts to appoint facilitators and small groups by the chair of the World Trade Organization Doha agriculture negotiations have fallen flat because of doubts and suspicions raised over the exclusion of several members from a small group meeting held earlier this month, said people familiar with the discussions.
The United States apparently lamented that if members are not able to agree on the process, then how can anything be agreed in the stalled Doha agriculture negotiations, said several people who took part in the meeting.
During a meeting of the Doha negotiating body on agriculture which is now being referred to as the Committee on Agriculture special session on Wednesday, the chair Ambassador Alparslan Acarsoy of Türkiye presented a report following a small group discussion he held on September 9 at his residence, said people familiar with the discussions.
The chair presented an oral note of his meetings with 12or 13 countries that included the United States, the European Union, China, India, Australia, Brazil, Canada and Norway among others, said people familiar with the developments.
The chair urged members to step up their consultations that are currently taking place in parallel among several groups such as the farm exporting Cairns Group , suggesting more members can be added to such discussions as part of what he called “enhancing engagement outside the COASS,” said people familiar with the discussions.
Ambassador Acarsoy suggested setting up a process as well as four groups for more targeted discussions. The four targeted groups, he suggested, would take up discussions on
1) market access,
2) domestic support,
3) public stock holding programs for food security purposes and specials safeguard mechanism for developing countries and
4) export restrictions and export competition, said people familiar with the discussions.
The chair also suggested four facilitators should oversee these discussions, though he did not indicate any names for conducting the targeted discussions, said people who asked not to be quoted. During the meeting on public stockholding programs for food security and special safeguard mechanism for developing countries, the positions of countries opposed to any outcome on the permanent solution and SSM remained unchanged, said people familiar with the discussions.
The fact that the discussions on these two issues ended within an hour clearly suggest that the opponents like the United States, key members of the Cairns Group, as well as some leading South American countries that these issues are unlikely to be resolved as per the mandate agreed in 2015, said people familiar with the discussions.
During the meeting, Brazil presented its proposal for “discussing trade measures that encourage sustainable practices” at the WTO, instead of taking recourse to "protectionist or other punitive trade measures”, said people familiar with the discussions.
Earlier, it proposed “a retreat in September 2024 on Sustainable Agriculture, in addition to identifying priorities and appointing a facilitator. Brazil suggested the General Council would oversee the discussions and report on progress, outside the COASS, said several people familiar with the discussion.
Brazil’s five-page proposal titled; “Dialogue on Sustainable Agriculture in the Multilateral Trading System (WT/GC/W/938)” has raised several fundamental issues that have been buried in the Doha agriculture negotiations.
“Sustainable agriculture paper is groundbreaking and allows members to have a serious and relevant forward-looking discussion on critical areas of interest for all WTO members, particularly developing countries,” a proponent told WTD.
Without naming the European Union and other farm defensive countries, Brazil has pointed out that “ad valorem equivalents (AVEs) of non-tariff measures are much higher for agriculture than for other economic sectors, while for food products, in particular, AVEs of NTMs are on average almost three times higher than normal tariffs.”
“Little to no attention has been given thus far to bringing together, in innovative negotiating formats, Members that are interested in creating trade-incentives for products meeting certain parameters of agriculture sustainability or produced in accordance with them,” Brazil has observed.
Given the multiple challenges arising from climate change and with the sudden proliferation of trade policies guided by “environmental goals,” Brazil says that “these policies must make the benefits of inclusive and sustainable development extend to all, including communities in rural areas left behind.”
“In other words,” according to Brazil, “the effectiveness of the global response to environmental challenges requires building national social and economic capacities ("no farmer will go green if he is in the red"), narrowing the gap between developed and developing countries through increased and more effective international cooperation, coordination, trade, and rulemaking.”
Also, as the global population is expected to cross 9.8 billion people in 2050, there is an urgent need to “improve levels of food and nutritional security worldwide,” Brazil has maintained.
More pertinently, “the commensurate boost in agriculture output has been made with marginal change in land use patterns in this period and relative decrease in participation on GHG emissions in comparison to other sectors.”
Brazil has posed a gamut of issues for further discussion. They include:
Policies that support sustainable and productivity enhancing agricultural practices.
Policies that support strong, science-based institutional frameworks and research programs that facilitate innovation and adoption of new agricultural technologies.
3. Policies that result in over-production, overuse or misallocation of resources, market distortions, or other negative impacts, environmental or otherwise.
4. Policies that promote access to food for people in situation of food and nutritional insecurity while creating enabling conditions for family and small farmers or groups in a vulnerable situation to participate in and benefit from domestic food markets.
5. Policies and mechanisms for technology transfer to enhance food security, build agricultural resilience, and encourage or incentivize low-carbon climate-friendly agricultural practices.
6. Policies that give more favorable access to agricultural products produced with more sustainable methods.
7. Cooperation in the definition of environment-related parameters for agriculture with a view of mitigating fragmentation.
8. The issues listed above are not exhaustive but outline some of the challenges and opportunities that lie at the intersection of agriculture, trade and environment.
At the meeting, several members expressed support for discussing the Brazilian proposal, while Nigeria sought to know what Brazil would expect from the discussions on its proposal, said people familiar with the discussions.
The United States appears to have expressed dismay at the Nigerian pointer, saying that if sustainability discussions can start only when this is notified and informed what are going to be the implications, then, how can members start any discussions, said people familiar with the discussions.
On a different note, Paraguay and Costa Rica seem to have raised extraneous issues on the decision on the Net Importing Food Developing countries (NIFDCs)-LDCs (least-developed countries) in 1994 (G/AG/3), said people. who asked not to be questioned.
Both Paraguay and Costa Rica seemingly questioning the re-classification process of the list of NIFDCS-LDCs even though they are not major donors, while donors like the United States are keeping silent behind the scenes, said people familiar with the discussions.
Summarizing his informal consultations with members last week, the Chair of the negotiations, Ambassador Alparslan Acarsoy of Türkiye, highlighted a recurring emphasis on the need to rebuild trust among members.
Questions were raised about the possible structure of the suggested thematic working group discussions. Some members called for pragmatic interest-based discussions, while others emphasized the need to honour past mandates or underscored the need for a balanced and realistic approach across the board.
Several members also called for fresh perspectives. They noted the quality of the discussions held on agriculture during the Public Forum and the workshop organized by the WTO in early July and suggested convening additional seminars to introduce new insights into the negotiations.
The African Group and the Cairns Group informed delegates that their bilateral meetings, which resumed after the summer break, have been conducted on a weekly basis. These technical-level discussions aim to find common ground and to draft modalities across all topics, in particular domestic support and public stockholding for food security purposes. They stressed the willingness of participants to engage constructively and expressed the hope that a joint proposal will be submitted to the committee for consideration in the near future.
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