True to form, the Minister of Trade, Jim Sutton, came home from the 2004 World Trade Organisation (WTO) talks crowing about the "triumph of multilateralism" and the successful agreement of a framework for continued trade negotiations. What really happened is an altogether different story. The negotiations as they unfolded in Geneva were in keeping with other WTO talks enabling the key negotiators to continue the illusion that a successful agreement of the Doha Round, which commenced in 2001, is in sight. It is true that the US and European Union promised "substantial reductions" in tariffs and subsidies but Sutton would be foolish to take them at their word.

While the WTO is grasping this framework desperately as "historic" and "a breakthrough", they fail to mention the shabby way in which the agreement was reached. Accustomed to marathon meetings into all hours of the night and select Green Room* meetings for the dominant players, media reports have failed to mention how many countries were not represented. Just over 40 trade ministers of the 147 member countries were present. Presumably the others were either not alerted to the significance of the meeting or could not afford to come. * Green Room – invitation-only meetings for a select few countries, behind closed doors, usually all-nighters, with no minutes taken. Ed.

Two of the largest developing countries, India and Brazil, were effectively bought off with access to the most elite negotiations. The rest were left in the cold, leaving agricultural negotiations around subsidies and tariffs and not on protecting developing countries’ food security and sovereignty. Once Brazilian and Indian negotiators have caught up on their sleep, they may well realise the huge price they have conceded. Already Devinder Sharma, spokesperson of India’s powerful National Farmers Coalition, representing 75% of farmers has said, "India and other developing countries should understand that they have been had by the complex technical language which now actually allows the US and the EU to increase their domestic support (of agricultural products)" (WTO-Info, Inter-Press Service, 4/8/04; Ïndian farmers fear new WTO deal", Ranjit Devraj). They will continue to "dump" exports below the cost of production at the detriment of local farmers. For developing countries this will mean greater impoverishment and further destruction of the rural sector.

What is all too clear from these talks is that there will be no final deal ready for the next WTO Ministerial meeting due to be held in Hong Kong in December 2005, especially given the US presidential election in November 2004, and the establishment of the new European Commission. What could be seen in Geneva is the way that rich countries have had to take countermeasures to protect their dominance after the challenges by mainly developing countries through the G20, G33 and G90 groupings (the actual numbers vary) at Cancun, Mexico (where the aborted 2003 WTO Summit was held). They have chosen to buy off a few members and to place more decisionmaking authority on the General Council rather than the Ministerial.

At the moment the New Zealand government has access to these elite level talks, especially through the role of our very own Tim Groser as Chairman of the Agriculture Special Session. Access to discussions is no guarantee of future benefits and Sutton would be foolish to think that discussions were enough. He would be better advised to listen to the many issues raised by developing countries whose markets will be flooded by dumped goods from the rich countries and the African cotton-producing countries that have nothing in hand.

Many issues are at stake and the Government’s preoccupation with access for agricultural goods and the removal of food subsidies means that they are missing more substantive issues around democracy, eradicating poverty, food security, the growing power of TNCs and ultimately multilateralism itself. These talks have further widened the gulf between the theory and the practice of trade. Perhaps in the coming months this gulf might finally prove that the WTO is unfixable.