Pacific Rim trade ministers agree to seek early Doha Round deal+

SAPPORO, June 5 Kyodo -
Trade ministers from Pacific Rim economies agreed Saturday to seek a swift
conclusion to the dormant Doha Round of global market-opening talks and resist
protectionism, while touting progress toward achieving their long-held regional
free trade goals, Japanese officials said.
On the first day of their two-day gathering in Sapporo, Japan as chair of the
Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum proposed mapping out APEC's new policy
goals when the leaders of the 21 member economies hold an annual summit in
Yokohama in November.
The officials said many participants expressed support for the idea of charting
APEC's future course by pursing three approaches -- pressing ahead with
regional economic integration, formulating a growth strategy and stepping up
cooperation in response to challenges such as food security and infectious
diseases.
The latest parley marked the start of a series of APEC ministerial talks in
Japan this year, but it was a rather embarrassing commencement as chair because
it came on the heels of political instability triggered by Yukio Hatoyama's
abrupt resignation from the post of prime minister.
But Masayuki Naoshima and Katsuya Okada, who will respectively continue as
economy, trade and industry minister and foreign minister in the Cabinet of
Prime Minister-in-waiting Naoto Kan, attended the meeting as co-chairs as
scheduled.
The day's session largely focused on the global trade liberalization talks,
with World Trade Organization Director General Pascal Lamy voicing hope that
APEC will lead moves toward progress in the Doha Round as the regional group
has evolved through trade.
But participants also acknowledged that the outlook remains bleak, with some
saying it would be ''extremely difficult'' to achieve the current target of
bringing the negotiations to a successful conclusion in 2010, according to the
officials.
The Doha Round negotiations, launched in 2001 under the auspices of the WTO,
have missed deadline after deadline due to differences between advanced and
major developing economies over issues such as tariff cuts and reductions in
export subsidies.
While a chair's statement is expected to be issued when the meeting wraps up on
Sunday, the trade ministers also agreed to release a separate statement on the
Doha Round in the hope of spurring progress in the process, Naoshima told
reporters.
''By doing so, a clear message will be relayed from APEC to the Group of 20
economies,'' the minister said. A G-20 summit will take place later this month
in Toronto, Canada.
Referring to the ongoing process to gauge the extent to which member economies
have achieved APEC's goals of trade and investment liberalization set 16 years
ago, participants agreed that ''progress has been seen up to now,'' according
to Naoshima.
''But we also think there are issues that we should continue to work on,'' he
added, pointing to areas such as regulatory reform and competition policy.
The so-called Bogor Goals, named after the Indonesian city where APEC leaders
reached the agreement in 1994, also call on less-developed members to try to
realize free and open trade and investment by 2020.
Australia, Canada, Japan, New Zealand and the United States are subject to the
progress assessment this year, along with other economies that have volunteered
for early assessment -- Chile, Hong Kong, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru,
Singapore and Taiwan.
Member economies have been working toward attaining the goals under an action
plan adopted in Osaka in 1995, which calls for actions in a total of 15 areas
such as tariffs, services and investment.
The ministers also compared notes on ways to promote regional economic
integration, including exploring possible pathways to a proposed Free Trade
Area of the Asia-Pacific, or FTAAP, while citing the need to create a strategy
to ensure economic growth in APEC as a whole.
''We saw support (from other countries) regarding the need for a growth
strategy so that we can avoid a recurrence of the global financial crisis and
swiftly recover from it,'' one of the officials said.
Japan is arguing that the strategy should comprise a multiyear action plan
backed up by a follow-up mechanism to evaluate the achievements to be made.
Naoshima said at the meeting that he is keen to share with participants ideas
on a new future direction for APEC.
''And in the APEC summit to be held in November, we would like to come out with
new policy goals called the Yokohama goals,'' he said.
==Kyodo
2010-06-05 23:59:34


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