Need middle ground to clinch global trade deal: Sharma

Trade ministers of key WTO countries will meet informally in Paris on the sidelines of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development meeting in the last week of May to review the stalled Doha round of negotiations.

Trade ministers of key WTO countries will meet informally in Paris on the sidelines of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development OECD meeting in the last week of May to review the stalled Doha round of negotiations.

A middle ground has to be found. We are clear that this is a developmental round. Over nine years,a lot has been invested8230;time and resources invested should not be lost and gains must be protected. The ministers will meet again informally in OECD,Paris,next month where all principle interlocutors will be present, commerce and industry minister Anand Sharma told reporters here.

The minister said that India favours that negotiations continue and be concluded successfully at the earliest.

Last week,WTO Director General Pascal Lamy lamented the sluggish progress of the Doha negotiations and had said,I believe we are confronted with a clear political gap which,as things stand,under the NAMA industrial goods framework currently on the table and from what I have heard in my consultations,is not bridgeable today.

In the G-20 finance ministers meeting earlier,Lamy had said,Nearly a decade worth of work to reach a world trade deal is on the verge of failure8230;The WTO system is in grave risk of not being able to conclude a round started almost 10 years ago.

He had also asked finance ministers attending IMF and the World Bank meeting to go back to your capitals and ask your leaders to consider the cost of failure of these negotiations,both from a micro perspective,as from a macroeconomic point of view.

Sharma said Lamy and heads of the three negotiating groups on agriculture,industrial goods and services would also be present. In fact,new drafts have been prepared after negotiations in Geneva at the official level and these will be reviewed by India to ascertain whether they meet the consistent stand taken by the developing countries for removing the historic distortions in global trade.

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The minister is going to review the progress of the talks from the view point of developing countries next week while maintaining that any global trade agreement must have a development dimension for the developing countries and should not be diluted.

Several issues in WTO negotiations still need consensus including special dispensation for the developing nations on freeing the market for agricultural and industrial products.