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HONG KONG WTO MINISTERIAL 2005: BRIEFING NOTES

THE DOHA DEVELOPMENT AGENDA
A brief summary of some of the items on the Agenda

The attached notes contain more information on these and other issues.

Contents
> Director-General’s letter to journalists
> The Doha Development Agenda
> Agriculture
> Cotton
> Services
> Market access, non-agricultural products
> Intellectual property (TRIPS)
> Trade facilitation
> Rules: ad, scm including fisheries subsidies
> Rules: regional agreements
> Dispute settlement
> Trade and environment
> Small economies
> Trade, debt and finance
> Trade and technology transfer
> Technical cooperation
> Least-developed countries
> Special and differential treatment
> Implementation issues
> Electronic commerce
> Members and accessions
> Members
> Bananas
> Statistics, Textiles and Clothing
> Statistics, Facts and Figures
> Jargon buster, Country groupings
> Jargon buster, An informal guide to ‘WTOspeak’

• Agriculture  back to top
  Comprehensive negotiations, incorporating special and differential treatment for developing countries and aimed at substantial improvements in market access; elimination of all forms of export subsidies, as well as establishing disciplines on all export measures with equivalent effect, by a credible end date; and substantial reductions in trade-distorting domestic support. Special priority is given to cotton.
    
• Services  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at achieving progressively higher levels of liberalization through market-access commitments and rule-making, particularly in areas of export interest to developing countries.
    
• Non-agricultural products  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at reducing or, as appropriate, eliminating tariffs, including the reduction or elimination of tariff peaks, high tariffs, and tariff escalation, as well as non-tariff barriers, in particular on products of export interest to developing countries.
    
• Rules  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at clarifying and improving disciplines dealing with anti-dumping, subsidies, countervailing, regional trade agreements, and fisheries subsidies, taking into account the importance of this sector to developing countries.
    
• Trade facilitation  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at clarifying and improving disciplines for expediting the movement, release and clearance of goods, and at enhancing technical assistance and support for capacity-building, taking into account special and differential treatment for developing and least-developed countries.
    
• Intellectual property  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at creating a multilateral register for geographical indications for wines and spirits; negotiations aimed at amending the TRIPS Agreement by incorporating the temporary waiver which enables countries to export drugs made under compulsory license to countries that cannot manufacture them; discussions on whether to negotiate extending to other products the higher level of protection currently given to wines and spirits; review of the provisions dealing with patentability or non-patentability of plant and animal inventions and the protection of plant varieties; examination of the relationship between the TRIPS Agreement and biodiversity, the protection of traditional knowledge and folklore.
    
• Dispute settlement procedures  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at improving and clarifying the procedures for settling disputes.
    
• Trade and environment  back to top
  Negotiations aimed at clarifying the relationship between WTO rules and trade obligations set out in multilateral environmental agreements; and at reducing or, as appropriate, eliminating tariff and non-tariff barriers to environmental goods and services.
    
• Special and differential treatment  back to top
  Review of all S&D treatment provisions with a view to strengthening them and making them more precise, effective and operational.

Other material:
> Doha agenda
> Ministerial conferences