US: WTO talks hurtling towards irrelevance

Ambassadors to the 159-member WTO were meeting to review progress towards a possible deal to be signed in Bali in December,which would cut red tape from customs procedures,adding as much as 1 trillion towards global trade.

At the insistence of developing countries who objected to having to shoulder most of the burden of the red-tape reforms,a Bali agreement would also include limited reforms to rules on food and agriculture and special treatment for poor countries.

While such a deal would be a boost for the world economy,the scale of the negotiation has been massively cut back from the far more ambitious Doha Round of trade talks,which dragged on for a decade before finally collapsing in 2011.