TOKYO, Feb 18 (Bernama) -- The Informal Mini Ministerial Meeting on WorldTrade Organisation (WTO) Issues held here over the weekend failed tonarrow a huge gap over the controversial farm trade issue and cheaperdrugs for poor countries, thus further clouding the prospect of meeting aself-imposed March 31 deadline.Further negotiations are expected to take place in Geneva, but the Tokyotalks is the last ministerial one before the March deadline.

Trade ministers from 22 nations and regions clashed in particular over thepreliminary draft proposal on farm trade released by Stuart Harbinson,chairman of the WTO Agricultural Negotiations Committee.

The Harbinson paper calls for a minimum cuts of between 25 and 45 percentand average reductions of 40 percent to 60 percent on all farm tariffsover five years.

These are larger than the average 36 percent reduction and minimum 15percent reduction per item sought by the European Union (EU) and Japan,but they do not meet the more aggressive demands of the US and Australiafor a uniform 25 percent ceiling on all farm tariffs.

Harbinson's draft also calls for support for the domestic agriculturesector to be cut by 60 percent and export subsidies to be phased outentirely within nine years.

The ministerial gathering is part of a new round of trade liberalisationtalks under the WTO that started in Doha, Qatar, in November 2001. Themembers are hoping to adopt the commitments by January 2005.

The 22 WTO members that participated in the meeting are Australia, Brazil,Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Egypt, the EU, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia,Japan, Kenya, South Korea, Lesotho, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand,Nigeria, Senegal, Singapore, Switzerland and the US Exporters, led by theUS and Australia, criticised the draft as "not ambitious enough."Importers, such as Japan and the EU said it "lacked balance."

The three-day meeting also failed to resolve disagreements on whether toease restrictions on pharmaceutical patents so that poor countries haveaccess to cheap generic drugs to cure deadly diseases, such as HIV andmalaria.

At the Doha conference, members agreed to allow poor countries plagued byAIDS, malaria and other epidemics, but not able to afford patented drugsproduced in industrialised nations, to produce cheaper versions of thedrugs.

The 145-member WTO countries are split over how much poorer nationsincapable of producing such copied drugs should be allowed to import fromother developing countries. On one end of the spectrum are the USpharmaceutical giants, who want to limit the number of diseases subject topatent waivers.

On the other are developing nations, which now make up two-thirds of theWTO membership and want the waivers to include not just epidemics but alsoother diseases they consider a danger to public health.

"We have expressed our disappointment that access to essential drugs forcountries facing epidemics such as HIV/AIDS are still constrained byon-going disagreement," said International Trade and Industry MinisterDatuk Seri Rafidah Aziz, who led the Malaysian delegation to the meeting.

Others are Malaysian ambassador to Japan, Datuk Marzuki Mohammad Noor,MITI Deputy Secretary General (Trade) Datuk Sidek Hassan, Senior DirectorMultilateral Trade Policy and Negotiations, Ooi Say Chuan, PrincipalAssistant Director Multilateral Trade Policy and Negotiations, Che MazniChe Wook and MITI Japan Minister Counsellor (Economy), Zulkafli Karim.

"The issue of TRIPS (Trade Related Intellectual property Rights) andPublic Health has a critical humanitarian dimension and should not besubjected to tactical negotiations," she told Bernama.

Malaysia has also reminded the meeting that it was necessary to discussspecific proposals already in hand, rather than generalities, ifnegotiations are to move forward.

"Malaysia regards the Harbinson draft as a good basis for seriousdiscussions by negotiators in Geneva," she said.

But, Malaysia has reservations regarding some elements of proposals in thepaper.

Malaysia is concerned that because countries need only to make a minimumtariff cut of 30 percent on their bound tariff rates, some countries, withvery high existing bound rates of 300 percent (such as for palm oilimports) will only reduce that rate by 90 percent and still have the veryhigh bound rate of 210 percent and they can at any time apply this rate.

Rafidah said: "This negates the spirit of market opening and tariffreduction, especially for products of interest to Malaysia, such as palmoil."

As such, she said that Malaysia has proposed that deeper cuts be made onbound tariff rates of 100 percent and above, and also amalgamateapproaches using bound and applied rates.

As for issues on market access for non-agricultural products, the ministersaid that the economic majors, particularly the US and EU have madeambitious proposals for tariff raduction, and in some cases, not providingfor the necessary flexibility for developing nations.

She said that Malaysia supports further liberalisation of trade inindustrial products but developing countries must be given the flexibilityto offer less-than-full reciprocity and have development needs takencognisance of.

On the meeting's outcome, Rafidah said: "Clearly the Tokyo meeting did notcome up with any decisions."

But discussions have made participants more aware of the divergentpositions and of the need to address the gaps as well as to seriously takeinto account the consensus of the developing and least developedcountriesm, she said.

She said that the divergent views and positions may not augur well for theFifth Ministerial Meeting in Cancun, Mexico in September 2003.

EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy also admitted that with many differencesremaining, the road to the WTO meeting in Cancun would be full ofobstacles.

"We know it is going to be bumpy but no round has flowed smoothly," hesaid.-- BERNAMA