EU Commissioner Mandelson's Remarks to General Affairs and External Relations Council

Summary: EU Commissioner Mandelson's Remarks to General Affairs and External Relations Council (7 November 2005: Brussels)

Peter Mandelson, EU Trade Commissioner, Remarks to General Affairs and External Relations Council, Brussels

I welcome the opportunity to report back to the Council after our discussion on 19 October, and to explain in the spirit of transparency we agreed where things stand and where I expect the negotiations to go in the coming days.

Since we last met there have been three technical meetings on agricultural issues between the Commission and member states. I understand that a fourth one is set for Thursday. I welcome these meetings to ensure understanding between us.

On 28 October Coreper met to discuss a further offer on agricultural market access that Mariann and I judged it was necessary for the EU to make in order to maintain progress. We presented this offer to key negotiating partners later that day. Let me stress that it was not only on agriculture. It was a comprehensive offer setting out our ambitions in other areas of the negotiations and the need for parallel progress across the board.

I have no doubt that, had we not done this, the political consequences we would found ourselves in would have been extremely damaging - and unsustainable for the EU.

I do not need here to repeat the details. The reactions of partners have been predictable. They have been forced to welcome the EU's engagement in the negotiation. They have mostly but not universally expressed disappointment in agriculture, and concerns at our ambitions in other areas. But they have not rejected our approach. It has been accepted as a basis for a serious negotiation, and this very publicly by the Director General of the WTO.

To be precise, the US does not think our market access offer in agriculture is enough to persuade Congress to slash domestic support. Also, it does not go far enough for Brazil, although half of the G20 like the level we have aimed at, while the G90 would be worried if we went further because of preference erosion.

Brazil is resisting our ambition on services, and a number of developing countries are worried about the implications for them. We need to be sensitive to these genuine concerns. Both Brazil and India are resisting our ambitions on NAMA, partly out of tactics. And the US is against our ambitions on anti dumping and development.

All this is without speaking of the positions of the vast majority of WTO Members who have yet to join the latest negotiations.

So there are many complications. But having made this offer Europe is in a much stronger position to negotiate and unlock the talks. First, we have started to inject more realism into the negotiations, on agriculture but also in other areas. And second we have made others understand that this can now only be a comprehensive negotiation, in which we have to make progress on all fronts simultaneously and with similar levels of ambition. Because the ambition - the pain and the gain for each of us, except, in the case of pain, for the poorer developing countries - is the product of linking all areas and looking at the overall result on offer.

What is going to happen this week and next week? Mariann and I have, as you know, a series of ministerial negotiations throughout the week. We go to these - starting in London this afternoon - with three aims.

• First, to win understanding and acceptance of our position on agriculture and the other areas, and to explain why we have now to negotiate a single package for Hong Kong covering all key areas of the Round. I expect to be pressed hard for more on agriculture market access. This I will not give. But I will explain what our proposals, including the treatment of sensitive products, will mean for our trading partners. I will in turn press others hard on our key interests in NAMA and Services.

• Second, in terms of process, I aim to ensure that we cover all issues equally. I will insist on this. Agriculture cannot take everything else hostage. Within agriculture, too, that means equal focus on each of the three pillars, and the inclusion of GIs in any discussion on market access.

• The overall objective is to arrive at a situation where we have, by later this week, or sometime the week after, a first blueprint for HK. Achieving it this week will be a tall order, and unlikely. Whenever it emerges, this blueprint will have to show a comparable level of ambition across the main negotiating areas. It should leave only some blanks to be filled in before and at Hong Kong. These blanks would include such things as the percentage cuts in agriculture and the treatment of sensitive products; the precise figures on domestic support; the negotiating parameters on GIs; the specific ambitions sought as a result of the NAMA formula; and the level of ambition in Services. They are things that can only be agreed at a high level, and together, on the basis that "nothing is agreed until everything is agreed".

Let me add a few words about our dialogue in the next two weeks. As I have said, we intend to continue technical explanations and analysis. These discussions are crucial for maintaining the essential trust and understanding between us without which we cannot secure a good outcome for Europe.

This is of course a two-way exercise. The Commission will remain the judge of tactics, will stick to the mandate, and will defend the limits you have set. It is reasonable for the Commission in return to expect member states to avoid taking public positions on the DDA that undermine or contradict Community positions . I understand the pressures that member states face from lobbies and NGOs. But succumbing to those pressures weakens our credibility, and therefore our negotiating position.

At the level of this Council, we will need to revisit the DDA soon. Today is not the moment for substantive conclusions. Trade ministers will meet over dinner on 21 November, and there is the possibility also to consider the state of the Doha Round in the GAERC. The nature for that discussion will depend on developments between now and then. We may by then know the shape of a deal on the table. Or we may not. Either that meeting on 21/22 November, or the meeting of the Council at HK itself, will provide the right opportunity for the Council to offer further guidance, if it is needed. But of course we are in the hands of the Presidency.

Ref: SP05-298EN
EU source: European Commission
UN forum:
Date: 7/11/2005

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