Davos closes on fresh trade promises[de] 

Meeting on 26 January, at the end of the week-long political and business networking event that takes place each year in the Swiss resort of Davos, trade ministers agreed to step up efforts to strike a world trade deal by the end of 2008. 

The 15 or so trade representatives agreed to meet in Geneva at Easter, which falls at the end of March this year, in order to thrash out the details of the pact. 

The announcement was welcomed with scepticism by business leaders, who received the same promise at last year's meeting with very little in the way of results (EurActiv 29/01/07).

The EU's trade chief Peter Mandelson stressed that while companies may be "frustrated" with the lack of progress in the Doha Round, they still have a lot to gain from it. He insisted on the need to move quickly: "We've agreed that if the round is going to be done successfully, it needs to be done this year. It needs to be done on President Bush's watch." 

"We are much nearer to 'nearly there' than last year," WTO head Pascal Lamy added. 

Politicians believe the threat of a US recession and a wider economic slowdown following the financial turmoil caused by the subprime mortgage crisis could act as an important driver for the conclusion of the seven-year long negotiations. Progress has repeatedly been hampered by the failure of EU and US negotiators to agree on farm tariff and subsidy cuts and the subsequent refusal of developing countries to open up their markets to industrial goods and services. 

"The mood of the forum was clouded by the financial crisis. Uncertainty continues," said K. Vaman Kamath, CEO of India's ICICI Bank and co-chair of the World Economic Forum (WEF). 

But, while the EU and the US fretted over the repercussions of the financial crunch, the fast-growing developing economies of the East, which have been spared by the lopsided crisis, underscored the need for "developed" countries to make further concessions if they want a breakthrough. 

India's Trade Minister Kamal Nath underlined the importance of concluding a trade deal in 2008, given what he called the "economic crisis facing the developed world". Brazil's Foreign Minister Celso Amorim added: "We have a window of necessity which is also a window of opportunity." 

Ministers and businesses present at the WEF also agreed to make 2008 a "turning point in the fight against poverty" and to live up to their "Millennium Development Goal" commitments made in 2000, notably to boost development aid to 0.7% of GDP, halve extreme poverty and halt the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015.