Agriculture negotiators met at the WTO on 24 May to lay the foundations for future discussions on farm issues. The new chair of the Committee on Agriculture, Ambassador John Ronald Dipchandra Ford, reported on his recent consultations with members. He said the challenge is to engage differently, to use negotiators’ time differently, and to achieve outcomes differently.
Report by the chair
The chair said he was encouraged by WTO members’ commitment to agriculture reform in spite of “some clouds that hang over the negotiating environment in general”. He stated: “I am confident that we will be able to work intensively and collectively to make progress in the negotiations.”
Instead of having a topic-by-topic discussion, the chair invited members to deliberate on his report regarding his on recent consultations with members and to provide him with “collective guidance” on the process and substance for future farm talks.
Summing up the chief lessons learned in the run-up to the 11th Ministerial Conference (MC11) in Buenos Aires in December 2017, the chair said there is a need to engage differently, with increased inclusiveness and transparency. Some delegations considered it critical to combine political will with data-based technical work throughout the negotiating process. Instead of aiming for a highly ambitious outcome, an incremental approach to achieving a substantive outcome was suggested.
Furthermore, some members were of the view that there was not enough focus on the broad objectives of the negotiations, the chair said. Some had made reference to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to which the agriculture talks could be an important contributor.
Regarding negotiation timelines, the chair said a clear message from many members was: “Time ran out at MC11 and this should not be allowed to happen again.” Some members said work towards achieving consensus should already take place in Geneva before the next Ministerial Conference. Many members called for an immediate resumption of negotiations and some warned against setting artificial and impracticable deadlines.
The chair noted that many members underlined the importance of “finding a way to build on past work”, and he invited all proponents to indicate how they would like to address previous proposals in the post MC11 negotiations.
With respect to the substance of the talks, “priorities remained broadly the same as they were before MC11”, noted the chair. The topics addressed in his consultations were domestic support, market access, export competition, export restrictions, cotton, public stockholding for food security purposes and the special safeguard mechanism.
The chair noted members generally agreed that sound analytical work could help to facilitate fact-based discussions. Many members expressed the view that work aimed at improving available information should be addressed in parallel to the negotiations. Organizing seminars and workshops to keep negotiators well informed was welcomed by most members, as was the use of information prepared by the WTO Secretariat and other international organizations. But some members pointed out the sensitivity of such information and dissemination exercises.
Wrapping up the session, the chair noted that many members highlighted the critical importance of the agriculture negotiations. He noted the broad support expressed by the membership for information sharing exercises to improve members’ discussions. He also took note of the need expressed by several members to remain cautious about such exercises.
The chair announced his intention to hold more informal special sessions addressing the priority issues raised, including dedicated sessions on public stockholding and the special safeguard mechanism.
He concluded: “The difficult environment should not discourage our engagement. With hard work, dedication and flexibility on all sides, we should be able to agree on how we proceed, close the gaps on negotiating issues and will certainly give ourselves a fair chance of working towards an outcome at MC12 and beyond.”
The chair’s report is available here (JOB/AG/136).
Members’ discussions
Members’ discussions focused on the way forward, priorities for the talks, information sharing and when to resume the negotiations. Their priorities remained broadly the same as before MC11, with domestic support and cotton being considered as priority issues by many delegations; public stockholding and the special safeguard mechanism also remained high on the agenda, notably for the proponents. Nevertheless, several speakers reiterated the importance of market access, export competition and export restrictions. The role of the farm talks in achieving the SDG of zero hunger was also acknowledged.
Some members called for immediate resumption of negotiations. But not everybody shared the same sense of urgency. One member asked for more reflection to better understand the current challenges farmers face. The importance of information sharing was stressed by many, with most of the members favouring addressing it in parallel to the negotiations.
Cairns group members (a group of agricultural exporting nations) submitted a document (JOB/AG/134) summarizing their comments on the way forward, in which they called for “restarting” the negotiations and underscored their “strong interest in addressing the inherent risks to global agricultural trade and food security caused by the accumulation of excessive domestic support entitlements” as well as their openness to explore ideas across all pillars. Acknowledging that some areas will be harder than others, the group members called for finding a way forward “which ensures that all members make a contribution and believe the outcome is a “win-win”".
Source: wto.org