WTO members review agriculture negotiation history, discuss ways forward

Negotiations on agriculture began in 2000, under Article 20 of the Agreement on Agriculture, but have achieved only limited progress since then. (See WTO briefing note online here).

At the 23 September meeting of the Committee on Agriculture in Special Session (CoA-SS), the Chair, Ambassador Ali Sarfraz Hussain (Pakistan), asked members to share their views on how to advance the negotiations. WTO Secretariat staff also made a presentation on the history of negotiations on agricultural domestic support as part of a series looking at how talks on various negotiating topics have evolved over time.

Many members reaffirmed that agriculture remains central to the WTO negotiating agenda and underscored the importance of the CoA-SS as the central forum for the agriculture negotiations. However, some members underscored the implications of the broader discussions on WTO reform for agriculture, while one member viewed the two processes as complementary.

At the meeting, many members expressed their desire to make progress in the negotiations and made specific suggestions to this effect. However, some considered that previous efforts at breaking the logjam on agriculture had proven ineffective thus far and called for reflection on the underlying reasons behind the impasse.

The suggestions aimed at resuming the negotiations included technical exchanges, thematic sessions, evidence-based discussions, and regular, structured engagement among members to help rebuild the conditions necessary for resuming meaningful negotiations. Some also suggested that technical exchanges be facilitated by a compilation from the Secretariat of all existing proposals, topic by topic, to enable a more targeted and structured discussion.