Hong Kong Holding Pattern - New York Times

Hong Kong Holding Pattern - New York Times: "The World Trade Organization might as well just adopt the slogan, 'Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow?' Because, once again, negotiators have postponed until next year difficult decisions to open up closed markets in agriculture.

The global trade talks that ended in Hong Kong on Sunday weren't a complete bust. Trade ministers from 149 countries agreed to eliminate export subsidies for farm products by 2013, to offer technical export assistance to poor countries and to get rid of cotton export subsidies by next year.

But this lame stopgap measure isn't even in the same ballpark as what was envisioned when this latest round of trade talks began in Doha, Qatar, in 2001. The talks were supposed to move countries toward eliminating all of the trade-distorting subsidies that America, Japan and Europe employ to give their coddled farmers an unfair leg up on the global competition. Doha also called for liberalization in services, which would be extremely beneficial to rich countries. But since those countries, egged on by France, balked at making good on their promises to liberalize farm trade, which would help poor countries, those poor countries weren't exactly feeling very amenable to liberalizing services.

Now ministers are supposed to gather in Geneva next March to figure out how they plan to get Doha done. But that doesn't leave much time to get a deal completed before President Bush's authority to get a bill through Congress expires in 2007.

This is all really sad. After more than 50 years of reaching agreements that have largely helped wealthy industrialized nations like the United States, France, Britain, Germany and Japan, this round of trade talks was supposed to finally put the needs of developing countries at the top of the agenda. But the interests of textile companies in America and farmers in France and Japan continue to mean more in the trade negotiating world than the fate of a hungry child in West Africa.

This raises the question of what, exactly, is the point of the W.T.O.? Free trade is not sustainable unless there's something in it for everyone. If the rich world can't figure out a way to get poor countries on board, then America, Japan and France might as well kiss goodbye any trade liberalization that will help their companies. And that would be tragic for the global economy."