Significant differences remain on the Chairman's Revised Draft on
WTO Doha Round Negotiations on Non Agriculture Market Access
(NAMA)
The chair of the Non Agricultural Market Access (NAMA) negotiating
group, Ambassador Don Stephenson, released on 8 February 2008 the
revised draft negotiating text to focus further discussions for
finalisation of modalities in this area. In the subsequent WTO
open-ended meetings which discussed the draft text, significant
difference in views have emerged.
NAMA-11 group of developing countries1 is not satisfied with the
draft as it retained the coefficients (8-9 for developed countries
and 19-23 for developing countries) in the so-called Swiss formula2
for cutting tariffs. In their view these numbers reflect imbalances
between the developed and developing countries as well as between
the texts on NAMA and Agriculture. These coefficients would lead to
overly large reductions in tariffs in developing countries.
Venezuela, in particular, stated that the text does not reflect
consolidated numbers proposed by the NAMA-11 group, but rather
incorporates figures, generated by the Chair with the aim of
forcing the Members to accept one particular view. ACP group
considers the implementation period of 5 years proposed in the
draft text as too short as they are undergoing a painful process of
reform and would need an implementation period of at least 10
years.
The text was subjected to sharp criticism by Brazil. It's
representative underlined that the draft does not meet expectations
of developing countries: developing countries expect the
development needs to prevail over reciprocity; they should receive
more benefits; the proposed coefficients are not the best tool to
find the balance between interests of developed and developing
countries. Brazil drew special attention to the issue of
differences in the approaches to NAMA and Agriculture in the course
of negotiations. Being generally satisfied with the "one size can
not fit all" approach adopted in the new draft text on Agriculture,
Brazil cannot accept almost uniform reciprocity strategy imposed on
developing countries in the NAMA draft text and considered it to be
an illustration of the policy of "double standards".
On the other hand, developed countries want the text to reflect
the balance between their interests and interests of developing
countries without providing major concessions to the latter. In the
view of the USA the 10 points gap between the coefficients (see
above) is too big. The EC complained that the Agriculture and NAMA
texts were going in the opposite directions: so many flexibilities
for developing countries with lack of consideration of the interest
of developed Members in the NAMA text are unacceptable. The EC is
also unhappy about the proposed longer implementation period for
recently acceded countries. Another active player, Japan, thinks
that the new NAMA text is not complete but it appreciates the
flexibilities of the text, which open the room for further detailed
negotiations. Overall, the new draft text, has not succeeded in
narrowing the existing gaps in the position of Members.
1 Argentina, Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Brazil,
Egypt, India, Indonesia, Namibia, Philippines, South Africa and
Tunisia.
2 Swiss formula: a compromise formula for achieving linear tariff
cuts proposed by Switzerland during the Tokyo Round. It was
intended to reduce higher tariffs by greater proportion than lower
tariffs. The formula reads: Z=AX/A+X, where X represents the
initial tariff rate, and A is a coefficient to be agreed on. Z is
the resulting lower tariff rate.
See also: Draft
NAMA modalities
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