Academic literature on the topic 'Doha Development Agenda (2001- ) http'

In contrast to early predictions during its accession, China has not sought to play a leadership role in the Doha Round negotiations or to rewrite WTO rules in a systemic manner. However, China’s role in the negotiations came into prominence during the ‘mini-ministerial’ held in Geneva in July 2008. Now included in the seven-member group (G-7), China came under fire from the United States and the European Union for failing to demonstrate greater leadership. This article seeks to explain the nature of that criticism and argues that over-reliance on the question of ‘Chinese leadership’ as an explanatory concept could aggravate broader misperceptions about China’s position in the Doha Round. According to these misperceptions, China has ‘broken cover’ and that it has become more ‘assertive’ while becoming more ‘protectionist’. In other words, there is the view today that China has emerged as a fresh obstacle to the conclusion of the Doha Round talks. This article analyses that misreading and argues that an analysis of China’s position in the negotiations must be tempered by a more nuanced understanding of certain tensions and mixed positions within China’s overall approach. The article seeks to explain China’s current position in the goods negotiations, on agriculture and non-agricultural market access, and in the services and rules negotiations. It also tries to explain the complexities of China’s alignment with developing country members and how that is likely to translate into various negotiating positions on specific issues. Finally, the article discusses a range of factors that are likely to play an important, continuing role in shaping China’s perception of specific trade issues and, more importantly, its perception of the overall worth of an eventual outcome to the Doha Round. These range from China’s reflections on the success of the 2001 accession process, its domestic political constraints, the emergence of a successful FTA programme, and resort to out-of- WTO aid for developing country nations, as well as the potential longer term impact of the current global economic crisis.

This article analyzes the rapidly changing context in which the negotiations on the Doha Development Agenda of the World Trade Organization take place, takes stock of the achievements so far, and attempts to delineate the main bottlenecks and conditions for a successful result, with special attention for the role of the EU. The challenges facing the negotiators have been daunting throughout the round, which started in November 2001: the agenda is broad and ambitious, the membership has expanded to 150, developing countries with clearly diverse interests have created coalitions, and at this stage time is clearly running out. So far, the intensified pace of meetings in all sorts of coalitions and subgroups has not resulted in a breakthrough in what is referred to as the ‘triangle of make-or-break issues’: domestic support and market access in agriculture, and industrial tariffs. A fiasco would not only be a missed opportunity to contribute to the prospects of worldwide economic growth and development but would moreover jeopardize the prospects of the WTO as a multilateral institution capable of serving the interests of developing and developed countries alike.

After the debacle in Seattle in December 1999, the Fourth Ministerial Conference of WTO members took place successfully under tight security in the capital city, Doha, of the small Arabian state of Qatar in November 2001. The Doha conference did not adopt any new treaty or protocoll to add to the network of WTO agreements already in place. It did, however, approve a ‘broad and balance ’ work programme in the form of two declarations—a main declaration and one on trade related intellectual property rights (TRIPS) and public health, plus a decision on implementation designed to alleviate the difficulties of developing countries in implementing the existing WTO agreements. In other words, the Doha conference agreed on the nature and scope of the next round of trade negttiations, named as the ‘Development Round’. Although some least-developed countries had argued that ‘no new round should be started until there has been full implementation of the agreements concluded in the last Round, and an evaluation of their effects done’, the Doha Conference decided to start a new round of trade negotiations. How development oriented is the agenda of the new round of trade negotiations? What is going to be negotiated during th e negotiations? Is it indeed going to be a ‘Development Round’ in more than name? The object of this article is to analyse the background to the Doha conference, to assess the nature of negotiations at the conference and to evaluate its outcome.

Having encountered objection from developing countries during previous negotiations, the WTO has tried to soften the framework of trade liberalisation in subsequent negotiations, held in Doha in 2001. In this round, the WTO gave rise to the ‘pro-development framework’ to attract fuller participation by developing countries. However, the development agenda had been assumed as a strategy in maintaining the superiority of advanced industrialised countries in applying ‘organised imbalance. This essay will discuss the implementation of special and differential treatment (SDT) for developing countries within TRIPS provisions. The promise of help through SDT for developing countries (as the majority of importer country of patented rights) is merely used as the medium with which to prioritise MNCs from developed countries which operate in developing countries.

This article focuses on the state of progress of negotiations at the World Trade Organization. Since 2001, WTO Members have been working towards the conclusion of the Doha Development Round. While negotiations have been stagnant for a long time, the arrival of Roberto Azevêdo has brought a new impetus to the discussions and led to the adoption of the Bali Package in 2013, making it possible to close the debates on about 10% of the subjects. Unfortunately, the post-Bali discussions were less positive since, although they produced interesting results in some areas, they did not produce satisfactory results on one of the most important multilateral trade issues, namely domestic support measures for agriculture. Even more problematically, the Nairobi ministerial noted a new difficulty, namely a lack of consensus on the very content of future negotiations. In this context, the ministers met in Buenos Aires in 2017 without a clear agenda. With an American administration not very inclined to multilateralism, and a group of countries ready to block any progress that is not favourable to developing countries, this Ministerial was a dead end. However, the Buenos Aires Ministerial was marked by the creation of three informal working groups. In parallel, many Members enthusiastically joined an initiative of the International Trade Centre on the empowerment of women in trade, suggesting that a new theme may have emerged at the WTO. The Nur-Soultan Ministerial Conference in June 2020 will determine whether Members are ready for a redefinition of the Negotiating Agenda. WTO Ministerial Conference, Doha Round, Plurilateral initiatives, WTO à la carte, Negociation Agenda, Buenos Aires Ministerial Conference, Gender

In the recent past, trade in services has emerged as one of the most contentious areas of the multilateral trade negotiations. In line with the “built-in” agenda of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), a new round of services negotiations, termed “GATS 2000”, was launched in January 2000, which were subsequently subsumed by the Doha Development Agenda in November 2001. India, from being a leading opponent of the GATS during the Uruguay Round, has now emerged as one of the forerunners of the services trade liberalization under the GATS. Given this backdrop, this article tracks the evolution of the GATS 2000 negotiations and puts forward a concise overview of the state of play, with a special reference to India.

This contribution reviews the WTO's achievements in the field of trade capacity building since the launch of the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) in 2001, and discusses the key challenges. The DDA has clearly created a strong footing for the delivery of the WTO's trade capacity building programmes. The evidence suggests that the beneficiaries are now much better equipped to address the challenges of the Multilateral Trading System (MTS), to take active part in the negotiations, define their strategic objectives and defend their economic and trade interests. There is no room for complacency, however, as key challenges remain to be addressed. Human and institutional capacity building remain a priority for developing countries, and irrespective of the outcome of the DDA negotiations.

When Kenya’s President, Uhuru Kenyatta, opened the first ever World Trade Organisation (WTO) Ministerial Conference to be held on African soil, he knew that the Doha Development Agenda (DDA)1 ceremoniously agreed upon in 2001, and of which his country had been an ardent promoter, would be put under the guillotine. So much was made abundantly clear by Michael Froman, the United States of America Trade Representative (USTR), in an op-ed published in the Financial Times just two days prior to the Conference. Froman argued that "Doha was designed in a different era, for a different era, and much has changed since", and that "it is time for the world to free itself of the strictures of Doha’, before concluding presciently that ‘Nairobi will mark the end of an era". The Conference of 2015 closed with a Ministerial Declaration and the ‘Nairobi Package’ comprising a series of six Ministerial Decisions on agriculture, cotton and issues related to least developed countries (LDCs). WTO’s Director-General, Roberto Azevêdo, concluded with optimism that, similar to two years ago in Bali, the WTO had once again delivered ‘major, multilaterally-negotiated outcomes’ at Nairobi. All these things will be analyzed in the following lines.

‘The even, uneven, and complex nature of the ground in the front or on the sides or in the rear should be examined.’ In the rapidly evolving stage of world trade, India needs to redefine its role from one that reacts to events, to one that shapes the same. The challenges to this are many: India is currently facing a spate of disputes at the WTO; its status as a developing country entitled to special and differential treatment is being questioned by a few countries, and; the development agenda for WTO reform on issues ranging from services to agriculture set forth at the Doha Round in 2001, remains unfinished. Since the 11th Ministerial Conference in 2017, the format for negotiations at the WTO has also changed with the mushrooming of ‘joint ministerial grounds’- which are informal groups dedicated to discussions on E-commerce, Investment Facilitation, Domestic Regulation in Services, and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs). India has been sceptical about engaging with such issues, the concern being that when there is unfinished business under the WTO’s Doha Agenda, Members cannot divert attention to new issues without a clear mandate. India needs to develop a clear strategy to address each of these challenges. This article discusses a few options that India could consider in reshaping its vision and role in the world of trade.

Without doubt, the year 2001 will remain identified with the terrorist attacks of september 11. To some extent, this goes for the European Union as well. The events of september 11 left an important mark on the European integration process, of which the development of the European arrest warrant is an important illustration. Nevertheless, as for the European Union, the year 2001 was more than a year of anti-terrorism measures. In the second semester of2001, the Belgian government assumed the presidency ofthe European Union. 2001 was also the year in which, only weeks after street violence disruputed the European Council ofGöteborg, a protester was killed in the margin ofthe G7-G8 Summit in Genova. In 2001, the gap between the European Union and the United States got larger for a number of policy fields, including National Missile Defence and the Kyoto Protocol. Yet, in the autumn of2001, both power blocks reconciliated at the WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha, Qatar. In Doha, a new global round of trade negotiations was launched. As in previous years, in 2001, the enlargement process was high on the European agenda. As for the latter, for the first time, ten candidate countries were mentioned by name, making their accession in 2004 a more realistic scenario. The eastern enlargement will radically change the face of the European Union. The Belgian presidency anticipated this impeding metamorphosis and stimulated the adoption of the Laeken Declaration in december 2001. The Declaration laid the foundation for the Convention on the Future of Europe which started on February 28, 2002. The Declaration of Laeken was one of the European highlights of 2001. The low point was the Irish referendum of June 7, 2001, in which a majority of the Irish population rejected the Treaty of Nice. Both events reflect the situation the European Union is faced with today, as they demonstrate the growing tension between the desires of «widening» and «deepening» the European construction. The future willreveal how the European Union went with this growing area of tension.