WTO deal step in process

OPPOSITION from France and Ireland forced EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson to hold out for a 2013 deadline for phasing out export subsidies in agriculture, three years later than other WTO negotiators and anti-CAP member states such as the UK had wanted.

But Irish Agriculture and Food Minister Mary Coughlan pointed out that the WTO deal in Hong Kong was only a step in the negotiating process, the final stages of which will be extremely important for Ireland, with vital issues on the table such as access to EU markets for non-EU countries.

At Hong Kong, only duty-free, quota-free access for 97% of exports by least-developed countries, from 2008, was agreed. These are countries with annual per capita incomes less than $750 (3% of products were left out because the US was unwilling to offer duty-free access to textiles from Bangladesh and Cambodia).