WTO chief arrives on Friday to give push to Doha Talks

New Delhi, Nov 18 (PTI) In a bid to expedite the much
delayed multilateral trade-opening agreement, WTO chief Pascal
Lamy is arriving here Friday to hold consultations with the
Indian government and industry to remove irritants.
Differences between rich and developing nations have
been a stumbling block in this regard and efforts are on to
reach an agreement under the Doha Round of WTO (World Trade
organisation) by 2011.
Lamy who will spend three days in India will hold
bilateral meeting with Commerce and Industry Minister
Anand Sharma.
"The two leaders are likely to discuss the progress of
Doha Round of Talks," a senior commerce ministry official said
Friday.
Besides, the WTO Director General will hold a meeting
with members of FICCI and academicians to ascertain views of
the Indian industry and civil society on certain vexed issues
which are holding break through in the global trade talks
which were launched in 2001.
India and other developing nations have been defending
their agricultural market to protect millions subsistence
farmers from easy imports that may result from the
multilateral agreement.
India is among key players along with Brazil, China and
South Africa espousing the cause of developing countries in
the WTO negotiations.
Early this week, Lamy said in Geneva that top global
leaders including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US
President Barack Obama had provided during the last G20
meeting in Seoul, "a clear signal that they expect the Doha
Development Round to be a deliverable next year."
The WTO secretariat on its own is likely to convene a
meeting of top negotiators in Geneva in December for further
talks and assess the progress on various aspects of the
multilateral negotiations.
As per the WTO estimate, successful conclusion of Doha
talks could boost the global trade by up to USD 200 billion in
a year.