It was announced today that the Doha Development Agenda negotiations of the World Trade Organization will be suspended. Heads of delegations, speaking in an informal meeting of the Trade Negotiations Committee on July 24th, agreed with WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy that this "will be a setback for all members." Lamy told heads of delegations in the informal meeting that he will recommend a “time out” to the General Council on July 27th. He did not suggest how long the talks will be suspended, but he said that countries need time to review the situation, and that if the political will to continue exists, the WTO will come back together to discuss all subjects in the Doha round.

Lamy decided to suspend the negotiations after talks among six major members broke down on Sunday, July 23rd. Ministers from Australia, Brazil, the European Union, India, Japan, and the US had met in Geneva to try to follow up on instructions from the St Petersburg Summit on July 17th. The WTO website said, "The main blockage is in the two agriculture legs of the triangle of issues, market access and domestic support, he said. The six did not even move on to the third leg, non-agricultural market access." “We have missed a very important opportunity to show that multilateralism works,” Mr Lamy told a press conference. Lamy said, "And let me be clear: there are no winners and losers in this assembly. Today there are only losers.”

Member countries blamed one another for the difficulties within the WTO. For example, some blamed rich countries’ demands for improved market access that would put subsistence farmers in poor countries at risk, instead of the rich countries tackling the distortions of their own subsidies. Several developing countries said failure to conclude the round would deprive them of outcomes that would benefit development, from the reduction of agricultural distortions, to the duty-free, quota-free package for least-developed countries’ exports and “aid for trade”. Several speakers at press conferences around the world said that they were still committed to preserving the WTO and its multilateral system. "One warned that some sections of public opinion, which do not understand the benefits, could celebrate the suspension." It seems that a clearer picture will emerge in September, after the European summer vacation ends. Read more from the WTO

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