"What are the main obstacles to a successful completion of the current round of negotiations on international trade (the Doha Development Round) and how could they best be resolved from the perspective of developing countries?"

The current W.T.O trade round was launched, November 2001 in Doha Qatar. Amid much hype and fanfare, it was hailed as a "development round" of negotiations. Launched less than two months after the September 11th attacks the talks began with high hopes all round. The mere fact the talk took place at all was an achievement in itself, considering the debacle that was the 1999 talks in Seattle which collapsed amid anti-globalisation protests and rioters being tear gassed on the cities street's.

Doha's agenda has been ambitious; aiming to not only cut certain barriers in agriculture as well as the highly protected services sector. It also set out to write new globalisation policies in areas such as investment and competition. Its main (and most significant) focus though was to help the poor. The rich promised to open their markets in area like farming and textiles to poor countries so heavily dependent on these sectors. They also promised to help not just with cash and debt cancellation but also with technical assistance.

An analysis by the World Bank, published in its Global Economic Prospects on September 3rd 2003, predicted that the ambitious aims of the Doha round to reduce trade tariffs and barriers could boost global income by between $290 billion and $520 billion a year. Well over 50% of these gains would go to some of the world's poorest countries. By 2015, the World Bank predicts that a successful Doha round could lift 144 million people out of poverty.

Unfortunately, despite these potential ga ...