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Ministers worked through the night Saturday before breaking a deadlock
that had pitted developing nations against the rich countries and the rich
countries against each other.
With time running out, the negotiations became frantic and produced an interim agreement to keep
moving toward trade liberalization. In the accord, richer nations pledge
to make several concessions to the world's least developed countries,
especially in agriculture and market access.
In a speech closing the six days of talks, World Trade Organization
Director-General Pascal Lamy praised members for taking what he said is an
important step toward ensuring that the world's poor benefit from free
trade.
"We are tipping the balance in the WTO soundly and steadily in favor of
developing countries," said Mr. Lamy.
While the interim deal is described as modest by many delegates and
trade experts, it saved the WTO's Hong Kong ministerial conference from
total collapse. There had been fears that this meeting, like the
ministerial in Cancun, Mexico two years ago, and the Seattle, Washington,
meeting in 1999, would end without an agreement. Some analysts had warned
that such a collapse in Hong Kong could fatally weaken the WTO's role as
the rule-making body for global trade.
While delegates were grateful to have achieved a deal, this one falls
far short of the original goal for the Hong Kong meeting. Originally, this
conference was to have produced the detailed formulas for cutting tariffs
and trade barriers needed to complete what is called the WTO's
four-year-old Doha Development Agenda.
The talks had been
deadlocked largely over the European Union's refusal to commit to a date
for ending farm export subsidies, a key demand of developing nations.
After pressure from the United States and developing countries including
Brazil, Brussels backed down, saying it did so in the interest of moving
the process along.
The United States made a number of concessions, including doubling its
trade development assistance for poor countries to $2.7 billion a year.
U.S. officials also said they would give free-market access to cotton from
Africa.
Tanzania's Communications and Transport Minister Mark Mwandosya said he
hopes the agreement will put the nations of Africa on a path to a new
beginning.
"We have depended on aid for almost half a century and aid has not let
us rid ourselves of poverty," he said. "Let us try trade, and the only
indication of how well the rounds will have succeeded will be whether we
use trade to eradicate poverty."
Developing nations agreed to continue working to open their markets to
manufactured goods and services from wealthier countries. But the accord
gave few details on how that will be done.
Even Director-General Lamy acknowledge that much more work needs to be
done to complete the Doha agenda. The deal sets a target of next April
30th for the WTO's 149 members to establish more precise formulas for
moving the development agenda along.
Not everyone was pleased with the results of the talks. Officials from
many aid agencies said the interim deal did too little to help poor
countries.
And more than seven thousand activists outside the meeting hall
protested that the WTO's trade rules hurt workers and farmers. The
activists began the week declaring they wanted to derail the talks and
prevent the delegates from reaching any agreement. Despite days of
protests, including a brief riot near the conference center on Saturday,
the activists did little to interfere with the talks. | 
