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Global trade talks fruitless once again

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published July 2, 2006

GENEVA - Negotiations on a global trade treaty ended in disarray Saturday when major trading nations failed to resolve differences on further lowering barriers to commerce.

More than 60 ministers from nations in the 149-member World Trade Organization had come together after months of failed discussions and missed deadlines to try to break a deadlock over sensitive farm tariffs and subsidies.

WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy had warned that the weekend talks were the last realistic chance to find agreement on lowering barriers to trade in farm and manufactured goods - a vital step toward a new treaty billed as a recipe for lifting millions of people out of poverty.

Most of the key negotiators spent much of the three-day meeting publicly blaming each other for the failure to move forward. The ministers are slated to meet again this month.

World leaders including President Bush have pledged their commitment to the talks, but most countries in Geneva rigidly stuck to the positions they have maintained for months.

Lumber dispute: The United States and Canada signed an agreement Saturday to settle a drawn-out and heated trade battle over softwood lumber, a major home-building component. The deal, details of which were first released on April 27, was signed at the WTO talks. The U.S. goal is to keep Canada's share of the U.S. softwood lumber market from exceeding the current level of around 34 percent. However, the deal does not impose any specific cap. Instead, Canada agreed to impose taxes on its lumber exports to the United States if the price of lumber falls below a specified level. The agreement signed Saturday will undergo a legal review in August. The Canadian Parliament must approve the agreement, but not Congress.

[Last modified July 2, 2006, 02:56:02]