Ireland

Walsh hopeful as lobby groups talk up reform

The Minister for Agriculture, Mr Joe Walsh, insisted that a "fair and equitable outcome" to this round of World Trade Ogranization…

Eoin Burke-Kennedy and Conor Pope
Mon Sept 15 2003 - 01:00

The Minister for Agriculture, Mr Joe Walsh, insisted that a "fair and equitable outcome" to this round of World Trade Ogranization (WTO) talks could still be achieved.

Speaking after the sudden collapse of WTO talks in Mexico last night, Mr Walsh said there was still time to reach agreement before the January 2005 deadline.

The WTO talks collapsed after five days of acrimonious debate surrounding trade in agricultural produce between developing countries and representatives of first world countries.

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There was a very genuine effort by the EU to have a successful round and in particular to help the least developed countries.
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Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh

Mr Walsh and Irish farming lobby groups have rejected the assertion that the talks had collapsed on account of the EU's heavy-handed approach to developing countries.

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"The EU has made more of an effort than any other contributor over the last decade to make trade more equitable," Mr Walsh said today.

"There was a very genuine effort by the EU to have a successful round and in particular to help the least developed countries".

Mr Walsh was accompanied at the talks by the Minister for Trade, Mr Michael Ahern, who also expressed his disappointment at the sudden collapse of the talks.

"Ireland worked hard within the European Union to make progress on all of the matters under discussion and the outcome does not reflect the effort we put in to secure agreement," Mr Ahern said.

"I believe that we must now redouble our efforts to resolve outstanding difficulties," he added.

The Macra na Feirme president, Mr Thomas Honner, said today that reform of the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) had proved that the European farming lobby had been willing to make "sufficient concessions" to ensure the World Trade Organisation talks in Cancun were successful.

"The EU went a long way preparing proposals for world trade when it had negotiations on CAP, which we changed phenomenally," Mr Honner said. These were to be our concessions to the WTO."

"To break down is a bit sudden," he added. "I think the other trading blocs were a bit hasty - nobody was ever going to get everything they wanted. We made fair concessions in how farmers receive payments."