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• Context
• The Ministerial Declaration and Developing Countries
• Minor Gains in Agriculture
• Disturbing Process in Services
• A complete Compromise on NAMA
• Meaningless Development Package
• Why did Developing Countries Signed on a bad deal?
• WTO Negotiations: The Way Forward
• Recommendations
   

Trade liberalization under the auspices of World Trade Organization (WTO) is an important aspect of globalisation. The WTO is promoted as panacea for all economic ills and short cut to quick prosperity. It has though passed its ten years but the process of trade liberalization has so far been partial and unequal. Due to imbalances in the WTO policies the WTO agreements are still under negotiations. The WTO has failed to successfully conclude even one round of negotiations since it’s founding in 1995 because of the fact that rich countries always put their commercial interests before those of developing countries. Poorer member countries, being weak economic players in global economy, have suffered a lot due to little or sometimes no policy choice. It is therefore worrying to note that economies of developing member countries are shrinking over the time with increase in poverty. Developing countries have been lowering trade barriers more rapidly than northern countries without getting promised results.

The 6^th WTO Ministerial conference was held recently in Hong Kong during December 2005 and ended with a ministerial declaration. Hundreds of delegates and ministers from member countries attended the official meetings while thousands of workers, farmers, environmentalists, students, civil society activists, journalists, health activists, and other human rights advocates came from countries as far-flung as South Korea, the US, Kenya, Brazil, the Philippines, France, South Africa, India and Pakistan to monitor WTO Ministerial process and manifest their overwhelming support to the delegates of poor member countries. Continuing from “Doha Round” (which was supposed to start off a round of talks on issues to help developing countries in world trade as it was recognized that the global trading system was unequal and unfair for the developing world), this meeting was billed as a “Development Round”.

Previous Ministerial Conferences

1. Singapore:           9 - 13 December 1996
2. Geneva:               18 - 20 May 1998
3. Seattle:                30 November –3 December 1999
4. Doha:                   9 –13 November 2001

5. Cancún:               10 - 14 September 2003

6. Hong Kong:          12 – 18 December 2005

Four years since the launch of the Doha Round, global trade negotiations were clearly in trouble going into Hong Kong. The Doha work programme suffered a major set back when the 5^th Ministerial conference failed at Cancun during September 2003. The collapse of the Cancún Ministerial was remedied by an agreement in Geneva in July 2004 setting out a framework for the remainder of the round. The framework agreement, also called “July Package”, provided broad principles for continuing the work on liberalizing agricultural trade, industrial tariffs, services and other areas. The July decisions extended the deadline for negotiations under the Doha Round work plan from the previously agreed time line of January 2005 to the end of 2005. During the run-up to the Hong Kong Ministerial, the negotiators were supposed to address issues (i) Agriculture, (ii) Non-Agriculture Market Access (NAMA), (iii) Services (GATS), (iv) Rules, and (v) “Development” provisions. Since then, however, progress in Geneva had been minimal. Deadlines and meetings had come and gone, with most countries repeating known positions.
 

The reason for this paralysis was mainly because of the rich countries’ agriculture policies. In an effort to build momentum prior to Hong Kong, the USA and EU made proposals on agriculture during October 2005 and claimed that their offers are major progress on all three ‘pillars’ of the agriculture agreement (domestic support, export competition, and market access). On closer inspection, however, the proposals proved to be more spin than substance, offering few or no real cuts in subsidies or tariffs and insisting on numerous loopholes to allow governments to continue to heavily subsidize agriculture and dump the surplus on world markets. Even then, the EU demanded a greatly improved access for European industries to developing country markets.

Progress was also minimal or negative in the other two main areas of negotiation: industrial tariffs i.e. non-agricultural market access (NAMA) and services. In NAMA, talks were bogged down over what kind of formula to apply to tariff reductions, and what sort of flexibility would be provided to developing countries.

In services, rich countries have not been satisfied with developing countries’ offers, so prior to Hong Kong they sought to change the rules of the game halfway through. Instead of a development-friendly ‘bottom up’ approach, whereby (unlike other WTO agreements) countries decide for themselves which sectors to include in the negotiations, the EU instead called for ‘benchmarking’ — a negotiated minimum commitment in terms of numbers of sectors and level of ambition — from all members. The chair of the services negotiations produced a draft text in October 2005 that suited the EU’s proposals, despite developing country opposition.

As the ministerial approached, the EU focused on what it dubbed a ‘development package’ of measures such as agreeing an amendment to the TRIPS (Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) agreement to improve access to patented medicines for poor countries; duty-free, quota-free market access for LDCs (least developed countries); ‘aid for trade’; and measures to address the problem of ‘preference erosion’. However, skeptics portrayed the development package as an attempt to divert attention from the need for reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

In the final month before the ministerial, as it became clear that ambitions for full ‘modalities’ (essentially agreements with numbers which members must then turn into individual country schedules) would not be materialized, the WTO Director General Pascal Lamy and other major powers began to talk down expectations. Instead of agreeing numbers, Hong Kong largely became an exercise in shadow boxing and ambiguity, laced with some small and heavily qualified steps on development issues.

The first draft of the Hong Kong Ministerial Text was circulated on 26 November 2005. The second revised draft was circulated on 1 December 2005, and a further revised document was circulated on 7 December 2005. This latest document was the basis for negotiation at the Hong Kong Ministerial. At Hong Kong, Revision-1 of the Draft Ministerial Declaration was circulated on 16 December 2005, and Revision-2 was circulated on midday 18 December 2005. The Revision-2 with some last minute amendments at the Closing Session of the Ministerial Conference was adopted in the late evening of 18 December 2005.

This paper offers a broad analysis of the outcome of the final Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration and looks at the future of Doha development Round and its implications on the country.
 

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The Ministerial Declaration of the WTO that was adopted on 18 December 2005 is a document of crucial importance which is going to guide the final set of discussions towards the successful conclusion of the Doha Round. The agreement reflects rich country interests far more than those of developing countries. Most of the difficult decisions were put off to a further meeting by the end of April 2006, but it is far from clear why rich countries that were unable to show the necessary leadership in Hong Kong will behave any differently in a few months’ time. A careful reading of the negotiated text leads us to the following overall assessment:
 

1. The Ministerial Declaration does not adequately project the pro-development promises of the Doha “Development” Agenda. The bracketed texts of the latest Geneva draft (with brackets and options) were “cleaned” largely in favor of the developed countries.
2. An end-date of 2013 for European export subsidies in agriculture that will actually leave the majority of the massive subsidies in the US and EU in place.
3. A major consolidation of the developed-country proposals on industrial tariffs (NAMA), based on an extreme formula that will prevent many poor countries from ever developing an industrial base.
4. A major expansion of methodology of the negotiations on Services, that will give multinational corporations new ways to pressure developing countries to hand over their financial and energy sectors and cut off access to public services for the poor.
5. A so-called “Development Package” that is mostly empty of real movement on key issues such as subsidies on cotton, market access for the Least Developed Countries (LDC’s), or development aid.
6. Among the developing countries, G-20 succeeded in withstanding the pressure of the developed countries, but yet they did not succeeded in extracting substantial dividends from Hong Kong. It is obvious that the advanced developing countries such as Brazil, China, India and South Africa will continue to exert formidable influence in the upcoming negotiations.
7. LDCs as a group received a limited market access deal. Some progress has been achieved in the areas of export subsidy in cotton, and in a few cases of special and differential treatment. Some promises have been made on “Aid for Trade”.
8. Pakistan’s ambitions from the Ministerial remain largely frustrated as it did not get meaningful market access, with no significant progress in other areas including Mode - 4.
9. Pakistan needs to strengthen its negotiating capacities during the last lap of the Doha Round. The country definitely needs to revisit its trade promotion and industrialization strategies in the light of the Hong Kong outcomes.
10. In order to realize the full potential of the Hong Kong Declaration, Pakistan will need to devote more time, resources and energy during this year 2006. Otherwise, there is a high and real possibility that Pakistan may turn out to be a net loser from the final deals of the Doha Round.
     

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WTO Members achieved little in agriculture in Hong Kong. Governments were unable to put dates on when final modalities and schedules would be completed. Instead, members set themselves a new deadline, April 30 2006, for agreement on some elements of the modalities. The only date agreed in Hong Kong was for the elimination of export subsidies: 2013, which is within a year of when the E.U. internal reform of the Common Agricultural Policy was set to eliminate the subsidies anyway. The export subsidy date is also contingent on quite a lot of hard negotiating still to come before April 30.

DOMESTIC SUPPORT: Members in Hong Kong made no progress on any aspect of domestic support disciplines. Three bands are proposed for reductions to trade-distorting support measured in the so-called Amber Box. The G-20 had asked for four bands (which in practice would make the cuts more biting), but Annex A already suggested that consensus was emerging for only three bands, reflecting the E.U. position and that of the G-10, which is made up of countries that also rely heavily on domestic support in their agriculture. The language on an overall limit, or ceiling, for trade-distorting domestic support is somewhat tighter than some of the proposals that preceded Hong Kong. However, no detail for cuts to domestic support programs is provided, including the de minimis levels, the blue box, final targets for amber box spending or the level of cuts to the amber box. All this means that it is still quite possible that the new rules for agriculture in the Doha Round will require no new reform to domestic support in the U.S. or the E.U.

EXPORT COMPETITION: The key issue in Hong Kong was the end date for export subsidies. Although the overwhelming majority of WTO members were pushing for an end date of 2010, the E.C. only offered 2013 and managed to hold the rest of the WTO to ransom yet again on the issue of setting a date. It is good that export subsidies are now set to expire, but time and again the E.C. has used the issue to distract debate from more urgent WTO business.

The E.C. was able to hedge its commitment with so-called "parallelism," which is a call for reductions in other forms of export support: export credits, food aid and exporting state trading enterprises (STEs). These disciplines are to be negotiated by April 30, 2006, when some kind of Ministerial Conference is expected to reconvene (most probably as a General Council meeting attended by some Ministers, of the type that agreed the July Framework in 2004). The disciplines on export credits, as proposed, would go some way to addressing the subsidy elements of the existing U.S. programs-the U.S. is the main user of export credits. The July Framework agreed to discipline "future use of monopoly powers," language repeated in the Hong Kong declaration. The STEs in question have already been reformed under domestic law and by the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture. The proposal is that future problems be avoided rather than new disciplines introduced. The more critical question of disciplines on the market-distorting behavior of private monopolies and oligopolies remains off the table despite the impact of their market power on agricultural dumping.

The food aid disciplines proposed would likely to force some changes in U.S. food aid practices. The U.S. provides some 60 percent of global food aid resources, but much of its food aid is wasted (as much as 50 percent in value terms) on unnecessary expenses incurred because of programs designed to serve domestic interests rather than the interests of recipients. Several U.S. food aid practices, particularly untargeted monetization of food aid (where the food aid is sold in the open market) can disrupt local markets, depress prices for local producers and commercial importers, and interfere with market signals on demand and supply. The Hong Kong text proposes a "safe box" for so-called bona fide food aid going to emergencies (this food aid would not be subject to new disciplines). This means some 60 percent of food aid would not be affected by the proposed new disciplines. WTO members then claim in the declaration that they will, "ensure elimination of commercial displacement;" an impossibly high standard (all food aid, in practice, causes some displacement; however some displacement is worth it, because it saves lives). A better objective would be to insist on targeting to ensure that food aid reaches its intended recipients and as few others as possible. The disciplines as outlined in the Hong Kong declaration will precipitate a big fight from the U.S. before the dust settles on an agreement in April.

MARKET ACCESS: Before arriving in Hong Kong, WTO members had more or less agreed on four bands for tariff reduction in agriculture. This was confirmed in the Hong Kong text. The more bands, the greater the likelihood of realizing real market access from the reductions; it is harder to hide high tariffs behind lesser ones when the bands are more narrowly defined. Developing country groupings such as the Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group also supported four bands for tariff reduction, but with higher percentage cuts and a lower maximum threshold for developed countries. On sensitive products, the only proposal from Hong Kong is that the greater the deviation from the formula (still to be agreed) for cuts within the four bands, the greater the tariff rate quota will have to be (which makes it possible to force more imports than would otherwise occur).

The text on Special Products and the Special Safeguard Mechanism has improved somewhat. There is now agreement that developing countries can self-designate the products, up to a still undetermined percentage of all tariff lines, to be "guided by indicators based on the criteria of food security, livelihood security and rural development". The issue of criteria is likely to be a sticking point for WTO members (such as the U.S.) that wish to aggressively liberalize Southern markets and therefore will resist criteria that are permissive. The price trigger, in addition to a volume trigger, for the SSM is also now accepted, a victory for the developing country alliance on SP/SSM, also known as the G-33.

COTTON: Little has been achieved on the cotton agenda. The declaration calls for the elimination of export subsidies on cotton in developed countries by 2006, yet the U.S. export subsidies have already been ruled illegal under the WTO Cotton Panel ruling, and the U.S. government is now obliged (and is trying in the face of strong Congressional resistance) to comply. Governments repeat their commitment to reduce domestic support for cotton more quickly and ambitiously than the general formula (which is still to be agreed). Duty-free, quota-free market access for cotton from LDCs is agreed. For the West African cotton-exporting countries however, it is the domestic support that results in cotton dumping, which depresses world prices, that is the highest concern. Cotton producer associations from West Africa have repeatedly said they do not export cotton to the U.S. Cotton producers want U.S. exporters to stop dumping cotton, not to increase market access into the U.S.

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Developed countries, in particular the E.C. and the U.S., were successful in their attempt to get closer to their objective of far-reaching market access commitments in services. Services sectors of interest to developed countries include energy, retailing, water, telecommunication, financial services and transport; all sectors that in large part are crucial for agricultural and industrial production and trade. Developed countries were unsatisfied with progress in services negotiations (the GATS) and consequently have been trying, since early 2005, to include numerical targets and changes to the bilateral request and offer process. A few developing countries such as India, Chile and Mexico supported these proposals.

In Hong Kong, developing countries opposing this agenda were successful in eliminating the reference to numerical targets. However, Annex C of the Ministerial Declaration explicitly sets the stage for plurilateral negotiations. This will allow groups of countries-known as "friends"-who are interested in a particular sector (for example energy or retailing services), to collectively table requests towards individual WTO members. This will increase the power imbalance, already visible in the bilateral request and offer process, since developing countries could now face market access negotiations with developed countries. The negotiating deadlines in the Ministerial Declaration-that plurilateral requests shall be presented to WTO Members by February 2006 and revised offers by the end of June-are not only unrealistic and overly burdensome, but also further enhance the existing power imbalance.

In addition, Annex C sets guidelines for the quality of offers to be made and paragraph 5 calls on WTO members to develop disciplines on domestic regulation. This creates a framework that will restrict government powers to regulate, undermining government's ability to implement regulations that respect and promote domestic policy objectives above the interests of foreign investors and service providers.

Overall, Annex C weakens the original GATS flexibilities, among others the freedom for each country to ignore requests for services liberalization. The Ministerial Declaration states that "countries requested to enter plurilateral negotiations shall consider such requests." Developed countries will use this language to push developing countries into negotiations. Yet the declaration remains clear that no such obligation exists and developing countries can continue reject the plurilateral negotiations.

Besides changes that will be made to the GATS, it has to be remembered, that the GATS is essentially an investment agreement. Deregulating services sectors under the GATS puts domestic laws and regulation under the scrutiny of the WTO and severely reduces the ability of countries to regulate their services sector. The U.S.-Barbados gambling case demonstrates this issue.

Moreover, services liberalization, especially in developing countries, has rarely materialized the desired impacts for development. For example, access to rural credit for farmers, or access to health care, education, water or transportation, particularly for remote areas, has in many cases worsened with liberalization. Private service providers, foreign or local, often only offer better quality services to consumers who can pay. The more government tries to insist on meeting the needs of all citizens or users of a service, the less likely the private sector is to invest. Making such liberalization a part of WTO rules means that a commitment to services liberalization will be extremely difficult to repeal if experience shows that privatization and foreign investment are having undesirable effects.
 

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The Ministerial Declaration agrees on a mandate to further liberalize trade in manufactured goods and natural resources, known as the non-agricultural market access (NAMA) negotiations. The NAMA framework is contentious and plagued with disagreement and divisions. Developing countries, particularly the African and Caribbean Groups, have rejected the text for years and yet the same details keep reappearing and are aggressively pushed; most often by developed countries. The Ministerial Declaration continues to promote the contentious NAMA framework. The elements adopted in the Ministerial Declaration reaffirm that WTO Members are unduly curtailing countries' rights to decide how to structure and set tariffs on manufactured goods and natural resources.

The Ministerial Declaration adopts a Swiss formula to cut tariffs in manufactured goods and natural resources. This is the most drastic way to cut tariffs and was rejected as an approach in the agriculture negotiations. The Swiss formula is designed principally to make steeper cuts on higher tariffs, so as to bring all the final tariffs closer to the same level. The approach prevents governments from using tariffs as a tool to protect chosen industries or natural resources-a tool used by every developed country in its past, and by most until the present day. The extent of commitment will depend on negotiations on the coefficients (the number that will be applied to the formula), which will determine the extent of the tariff cut.

The Ministerial Declaration also adopts a drastic approach to binding and reducing those tariffs that have not yet been bound. While binding tariffs can be useful because it provides a degree of transparency and reliability for exporters it ultimately gives export interests priority over others such as securing jobs or the environment. Countries that already have low tariffs as a result of pressure from bilateral or multilateral donors will lose even further the possibility to raise tariffs if they want to build up an industry or merely to protect jobs at home in sectors that might not aim to compete at the global level. Binding tariffs in the manner specified in the Ministerial Declaration is a major concession from developing countries. Developing countries will be deprived of an important tool to implement industrial policies and a source of revenue they badly need for public investment. It will be workers in the South and also in the North who will be the losers if the proposed liberalization of manufacturing goes through.

The Ministerial Declaration also recognizes that some members, predominantly developed country Members, are pursuing negotiations on different sectors with the objective of complete tariff elimination. The sectors include, forests, fish, electronics, chemicals, and raw materials. To date, sectoral negotiations have taken place outside the NAMA negotiations. They completely lack transparency and exclude the majority of the membership, many of who reject the inclusion of such initiatives in the negotiations. Yet, the Ministerial Declaration legitimizes the sectoral negotiations and accepts them as a fait accompli. This is unacceptable and adds fuel to an already blazing fire.
 

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The development package is insulting for several reasons. First, developing countries want meaningful reforms to trade rules to address the profound inequities in the existing global trade system-not a meager aid package. Sadly, this package was used as a major distraction in Hong Kong, while proposals in the interest of African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) country members were ignored (a number of ACP countries are not LDCs, and so were excluded from the development package in any event). Aid certainly does not belong in the WTO and it has never been helpful in Africa. It has been misused and abused to put all kinds of conditionalities on African governments.

Secondly, many civil society organizations have already exposed that there is not much new money available and that most is in the form of loans, which would further indebt countries. Thirdly, while aid is not without merit, it is not a substitute for strong multilateral trade rules that prevent dumping and protect countries' right to design domestic policies according to their people's needs, whilst ensuring they do not harm other countries. The money being pledged from developed countries would be better spent assessing the impacts of trade liberalization and its ability to create jobs, foster industrial and agricultural development, to end dumping, and to redistribute wealth from developed to developing countries. Fourth, the need for a meaningful development round extends far beyond LDCs - for instance, among the most vulnerable economies in the world trading system are the islands of the Caribbean, only one of which is an LDC (Haiti), and both India and Brazil, despite being a large country, faces serious challenges in addressing poverty too.
 

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The mood among most developing countries in the final Heads of Delegation meeting was one of grudging acceptance rather than celebration. Cuba (on NAMA) and Venezuela (on NAMA and services), asked for their reservations to be noted, but did not bring about a collapse.

Almost all delegates agreed that a further Cancún-style collapse would damage the WTO as an institution, perhaps terminally, and were keen to avoid such an outcome.

From the first day of the ministerial, delegates appeared fearful of being blamed for collapse and there were regular reports of Northern negotiators using this tactic to put pressure on developing countries. They placed developing countries between a rock and a hard place, pushing their own agendas while saying that developing country inflexibility would precipitate a breakdown for which they would be blamed. Crude though it is, the tactic clearly worked with some ministers.

Beyond the psychology of the ministerial, the truth is that most of the big decisions on issues like NAMA, services, and agriculture were deferred until later. The doors were left sufficiently open in complex negotiations that all ministers left feeling that at least something could be achieved for their countries in the future. If developing countries had not asserted themselves in the way they did, the final text would have been much worse.

Developing country ministers, like politicians anywhere, are keen to return from the ministerial with something tangible to show their voters and businesses and so could be persuaded to accept concessions now (duty free quota free, an end date for export subsidies) in exchange for vaguer, but potentially much more significant concessions further down the line. The political economy of negotiations also plays a role — for LDCs in particular, the future industries and service sectors that might one day be undermined by bad NAMA or services agreements do not yet exist, and so have no lobbyists to press their case.

WTO Negotiations: The Way Forward

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The outcome of the Hong Ministerial raises several questions. Why are we moving further away from the objective of a Development Round? Why did developing countries agree to this text? Why do governments continue to craft trade rules only in the interests of exporters? Why do governments accept trade deals that do not reflect the interests of their people? The answers are complex and varied and require further discussion.

The final outcome of the Doha Round now depends on the world leaders, from both developed and developing countries. The US government’s ‘trade promotion authority’ (better known as ‘Fast Track’), will run out in June 2007, setting a hard political deadline. Without Fast Track, Congressional consideration of a trade agreement is considered legislatively impossible. Even with Fast Track, any final Doha Round agreement must go to Congress several months earlier if it is to be approved in time. That means modalities must be completed in mid-2006, to allow time for the technical work required to complete detailed schedules of commitments in different sectors and products within the Fast Track timetable.

The text approved in Hong Kong requires that modalities be agreed by 30 April 2006, but few delegates believe that this can be done. After 16 months of hard bargaining, Hong Kong was only able to inch the process forward from the July 2004 framework. As delegates and governments digest this situation over the next few weeks, the realization is likely to dawn that we are probably in for a long round.

If the round stretches into the next decade, the developmental implications depend on broader geopolitical shifts, but events since Doha (the growing assertiveness of developing country groups such as the G20 and G33, the wider crisis of the Washington Consensus) give some cause for optimism that the longer the round, the better the eventual outcome. Furthermore, as long as negotiations are proceeding, they may exercise some level of restraint on Northern protectionism and perhaps on the push for WTO-plus regional trade agreements. However, the price of a long round is high in terms of prolonging the sufferings of an unjust world trading system that condemns developing countries to poverty.

In order to try and reach its 30 April 2006 deadline for modalities in agriculture and NAMA, delegates will be congregating once more in the first few months of 2006. This could either be a full ministerial or (more probably) a ‘general council plus ministers’ like the one that agreed the July Framework Agreement in 2004.

The civil society organizations have serious concerns about this General Council option. It is vital that any such decision does not seek to move negotiations behind the closed doors of the WTO, away from public scrutiny, and even some ministers, as happened to some extent in July 2004. A General Council is not the place to make decisions of this gravity. Moreover, when they reconvene, WTO members will still face the same hard choices that confronted them in Hong Kong, and unless the rich countries are willing to put radically new offers on the table, it will be no easier to reach agreement, still less one that delivers on the development promises made in Doha. Rich country negotiators cannot simply turn up and carry on where they left off in Hong Kong. They need to go away, examine their consciences, and make a New Year’s resolution to turn this into a development round for the world’s poor.

The Doha Round, launched four years ago, is in danger of grinding to a standstill. Rich countries have both a moral duty and long-term self interest in seeing a world free from extreme poverty and hunger. Not only have they failed to deliver on their Doha promises, there are worrying signs that the round has lost its way and reverted to a traditional ‘might is right’ negotiation in which the final outcome could do more harm than good for development.
 

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Raising National Capacities: At the end of the day Pakistan has to competently fight for its national trade interests. What is necessary in such cases, apart from technical preparation, is political determination, familiarity with the WTO process, effective political outreach and the nerve to withstand pressure. Regrettably, Pakistan was not sufficiently endowed with all those.

Export Diversification: Export diversification should have always been a top priority for Pakistan. Given the overwhelming dependence of Pakistan on few products (textile, apparels, clothing, cotton and rice) there is need for identifying new products which are to be promoted through appropriate trade and investment strategies.

Revisiting Export Strategies: Pakistan also needs to revisit its export promotion strategies from another perspective. Pakistan has quite often tried to promote its exports through tariff concessions. In the light of the Hong Kong Declaration, as well as MFN liberalisation in general under the NAMA and Agriculture negotiations, this possibility is getting increasingly thin. Pakistan now needs to put more emphasis on acquiring competitive advantage through efficiency gains in the area of trade supportive infrastructure (port, transportation, electricity, telecommunications) as well as overall economic governance.

Strengthening of Consultative Process on WTO: There is though a mechanism of consultative process in place in the Ministry of Commerce (MoC) for seeking advice from the stakeholders on WTO related issues. This consultative process needs to be further strengthened to ensure more effective contribution to safeguarding Pakistan’s interests in the WTO. The consultations should be held more regularly, presence of major stakeholders should be ensured and the preparations for the meetings should be made in a manner that encourages concrete proposals to emerge from these meetings.

Further Strengthening of the WTO Cell: The setting up of the WTO-cell within the Ministry of Commerce was a decision in the right direction. This has evidently strengthened the Ministry’s capacity to deal with WTO related issues. The WTO-cell will need to be further strengthened with human and logistics support to enable the cell to work more effectively. Adequate attention should be given to skill upgradation, training and appropriate incentive package to attract and retain cadres. This is also essential to support the Geneva process with substantive inputs.

Strengthening of the Geneva Mission: Pakistan’s Mission in Geneva has been doing a commendable job under very difficult conditions. However, in view of the tasks ahead and the demands of negotiations under the Doha Work agenda, the Mission needs to be further strengthened and there is a need to allocate more resources to the Mission. This would allow Pakistan to participate more effectively in the various important meetings being held in Geneva in the context of the ongoing negotiations.

Dedicated Commerce Secretary to deal with WTO Issues: In order to deal with and address WTO related issues in a more informed manner and on an ongoing basis many developing countries have restructured their administrative and bureaucratic set up. In many countries there is a dedicated Commerce Secretary supported by Joint Secretaries and other officers down the line to provide the necessary support. At present the Commerce Secretary of Pakistan has to deal with both domestic and international trade related issues which puts a lot of pressure on his time. The demands originating from the WTO work plan in the coming days call for an appropriate restructuring of responsibilities within the Commerce Ministry to enable it deal adequately with the tasks at hand.

Private Sector Representative in Geneva: It goes without saying that Pakistan’s private sector has interests in the ongoing negotiations in Geneva and their possible outcomes. The decisions made through the WTO negotiations are going to have important implications for Pakistan’s external sector performance and interests of the business. As such, there is a need for the private sector to be better informed about the negotiations in Geneva and to strategize accordingly. The private sector should seriously consider the idea of having a representative in Geneva who could monitor the negotiations and study the possible implications for business, and provide feedbacks to the trade bodies and Chambers the Ministry of Commerce and the Geneva Mission. A number of countries have such representatives in Geneva whose work complement the work of their respective national Missions.

Setting up a National Committee to Review the Hong Kong Declaration: The Ministerial Declaration coming out of Hong Kong needs careful scrutiny by all stakeholders in Pakistan. This is required because the declaration provides important guidelines for future negotiations in a number of key areas of interests to Pakistan including NAMA, Agriculture and Services. Pakistan will need to articulate its negotiating strategies in view of these guidelines. In view of this Pakistan will need to design appropriate strategies to take advantage of the emerging opportunities. Thus an indepth analysis of attendant opportunities and risks will need to be carried out by the government, through wide and indepth consultations with the trade bodies, experts, and other stakeholder groups. In implementing these tasks the Ministry of Commerce will have to device means and methods to effectively draw on other trade analysis capacities available in the country.

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