By Bernama
Melbourne : A successful conclusion to the Doha round of global trade talks is of supreme importance and essential to fostering sustained economic growth, says the Australian Government.
Further trade reform is even more important considering the current climate of instability in financial markets and higher global food prices, the Australian Associated Press (AAP) said in a report.
Australias Trade Minister Simon Crean said the path to sustained economic growth for developed and developing countries alike lies in expanding trade opportunities further.
“But the single most important step we need to take now to strengthen the global trading system is to successfully conclude the Doha round,” he told a seminar in Canberra on Australia’s role in addressing the future of multilateral trading.
He said a successful conclusion to Doha is Australias most important trade negotiations priority and will strengthen the multilateral trading system.
“A conclusion to Doha will also give a much needed confidence boost to the global economy at a time of some uncertainty on global financial markets,” AAP quotes Crean as saying.
“We also need to take advantage of the effects of high world food prices and lock in subsidy reform in agriculture at a time when producer incomes are high.”
In the past six weeks there has been some encouraging progress in the negotiations in the core areas of agriculture, industrial products and services.
There is also growing support for a “signalling conference” on services in the near future at which it is hoped key World Trade Organisation members will show their commitment to making significant improvements in their services offers.
“Progress is being made in Geneva with the critical gateway issues of sensitive products as well as with other flexibilities in market access for agriculture and industrial products,” Crean said.
“Making progress on these issues will allow us to address the level of ambition we expect from reforms in these areas, as well as in services.”
Crean noted that there had been a great deal of intensive work in Geneva in the past couple of weeks in particular on these “gateway” issues.
But he said the key is to maintain momentum in the coming weeks so that the breakthroughs necessary to conclude the Doha round can be achieved.