Negotiations to free up world farm trade are edging forward, with some consensus emerging on elements of a possible deal, but with many difficulties remaining, diplomats said yesterday.
"We have made some progress... The attitude has been business-like and positive," said chief US farm negotiator Allen Johnson as four days of talks at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) drew to an end.
The WTO's 147 member states are racing to clinch outline accords on lowering commercial barriers to trade in farm and industrial goods by the end of July, after which the US election campaign puts an effective end to any further negotiation for this year.
The timetable is tight, with diplomats saying that negotiators in Geneva must complete work by mid-July, if governments are to have time to approve a deal before it goes to the WTO's executive General Council at the end of the month.
"By mid-July we need a clear sense of whether a deal is doable or not," said Carlo Trojan, the European Union's ambassador to the WTO.
Trojan echoed Johnson's view that the talks were advancing, saying that there was consensus that all countries, with the exception of the poorest, would have to accept some opening of their farm markets.
"There is emerging convergence that we must deliver a substantial improvement in market access and there is a consensus that every member must contribute," he told journalists.
After the EU announced last month that it was willing to negotiate an end to export subsidies, market access has emerged as the toughest obstacle to a farm deal.
The G20 developing country alliance, led by Brazil, India and South Africa, last week presented a new plan which put the onus firmly on richer states to make the largest concessions.
But Mr Johnson said that the US government needed to show its farmers that they were going to have new opportunities to export, not just to rich countries, if it was going to be able to convince them to accept cuts in state subsidies.
Some diplomats said that further progress in Geneva could need new guidance from ministers, with a first opportunity coming with the meeting of the United Nations' trade and development agency UNCTAD in Sao Paulo in mid-June.
Trade ministers from a core group of five trading powers - the United States, the EU, India, Brazil and Australia - plan to meet there as do G20 ministers.
The farm talks are part of the Doha Round of free trade negotiations, launched in the Qatari capital in late 2001 and now way behind schedule. The round was due to be completed by the end of this year, but the WTO has yet to set a fresh deadline.