The political obituary of the WTO Doha Round has been written so many times over the past five years or so that it comes as something of a surprise to realise that the negotiations are not yet dead. Rather, elements of a trade liberalising agreement on agriculture may yet be agreed at a high-profile meeting later this year. There are of course plenty of caveats to be written into that last statement. Not least of these is the fact that the agreement now being sought at the WTO ministerial conferencein Bali on December 3-6, if it is actually achieved (which is by no means certain), would only represent a very small downpayment on the overall package of agricultural trade reforms which the Doha Round set out to deliver some 12 years ago.
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