Global trade talks are on their "last lap" but sticking points on agriculture and industrial goods must be solved by March for there to be a deal by year's end, the head of the World Trade Organisation said Thursday.
"The political conditions for reaching a deal on the modalities have never been better," WTO Director General Pascal Lamy told a meeting of the Trade Negotiating Committee in Geneva.
"We are on the last lap and it is now time to start our sprint towards the finish line," he added.
Agriculture is a particularly crucial element in the WTO Doha round of talks which aim to cut barriers and spur development but which have been mired in deadlock and disagreement since their launch back in November 2001.
Developing and emerging nations want cuts in rich country farm subsidies and in import tariffs for agricultural produce, while industralised nations want better access to markets in poorer economies for their manufactured goods in return.
The WTO's chief negotiator on agriculture is set to issue a revised text on the issue next week, in parallel with a similar text on industrial goods, known in the WTO as non-agricultural market access (NAMA).
These texts will be studied in national capitals before work resumes at the WTO negotiating groups, with the aim of ironing out as many differences so the texts can then be put before a ministerial meeting around Easter in late March.
"We have no time to waste and ... we will have to see a very intensive pace of work over the coming weeks," Lamy said.
WTO members broadly agreed with Lamy's analysis of the process ahead but there are emerging differences on the scope of the negotiations, trade sources said.
Some parties such as the European Union and India want more detail on service industries and rules, as well as agriculture and NAMA, whilst others such as the United States and Brazil have warned against over-burdening the negotiations, the sources said.
"All members need to have an assurance that all their issues are moving forward towards a broad and balanced outcome which fulfils our mandate," Lamy said.Agence France Presse
