Developing nations see some signs of agreement in world-trade talks on the eve of an important meeting with rich nations to avert an impasse, Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said on Saturday.
Reform of farm trade lies at the heart of the informal World Trade Organization (WTO) talks yesterday, and Amorim said much work remained to ensure poor nations did not lose gains of recent months.
"There are some indications of more positive convergences. Let us pursue them," Amorim told fellow trade ministers for the G20 group of developing nations. "Let us build on our achievements so far and make sure that this positive momentum will be maintained."
Trade and foreign relations ministers are meeting in Sao Paulo to get world free-trade talks back on track after they collapsed last September in Cancun, Mexico.
The impasse came as the G20 pushed to center stage its demands for the US and other rich nations to cut export and domestic subsidies and lower tariff barriers for farm products.
The developed world gives its farmers around US$300 billion a year in subsidies, which developing nations say undercut the competitiveness of their products and fuel poverty.
Amorim, who leads the G20, will meet with ministers from the US, EU, India and Australia at the UN Conference on Development and Trade in Sao Paulo.
All momentum for the Doha round of WTO trade talks, which is supposed to be concluded this year, could be lost if a deal is not reached by mid-July, negotiators say.
After July, the US will be distracted by November presidential elections and the EU will also see sweeping changes in its executive commission.
The EU has offered to discuss an end to farm export subsidies, provided other rich nations follow suit. Amorim said the G20 needed assurances that nations like the US and Canada were prepared to meet the EU demand.
Work is also well-advanced on the question of the huge domestic subsidies rich states give their farmers.
The third so-called "agricultural pillar" of the talks is import duties, but cutting tariffs in rich and poor nations remains a stumbling block.
A G20 proposal in May put the onus on rich nations to cut import duties, the EU rejected the offer as unacceptable and vague. The G20 claims a joint EU-US blueprint on tariff barriers is too soft on rich nations and hard on the poor.
"It is essential that we put forward a coherent and credible strategy in order to ensure a successful outcome," Amorim told G20 ministers.
The issue could still create divisions among leading G20 nations.
India is demanding full market access for its exports and tariff protection for the hundreds of millions of farmers who swept its new left-leaning government to power.
Brazil, one of the world's leading agricultural exporters, is pushing for tariff elimination in poor countries to move world trade talks along, Amorim said on Friday.
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