[OPE] GDAE Policy Brief: No basis to restart WTO talks

gerald_a_levy@msn.com

Back to the Drawing Board:No basis for concluding the Doha Round of negotiationsBy Kevin P. Gallagher and Timothy A. WiseRIS Policy Brief #36, April 2008 
Negotiators continue to work desperately to achieve a breakthrough in the World Trade Organization’s Doha Round.  Their goal is to get an agreement by the end of 2008.  Developing countries should pull the plug on these moribund negotiations until rich countries can agree to a new framework that lives up to Doha’s promise to be a “Development Round” that favors poorer countries.
As rich country leaders try to rally negotiators for yet another “make-or-break” deadline, in what has become the most imminent agreement in history, developing country negotiators should remember why the proposals on the table deserve to be sent back to the drawing board.  
In this policy brief published by the Indian institute RIS, GDAE’s Kevin P. Gallagher and Timothy A. Wise review the economic projections, from the World Bank and other institutions, that show how limited the gains are for most developing countries and how high the hidden costs of an agreement could be.  With projected gains of less than 0.2% of GDP, poverty reduction of just 2.5 million people (less than 1%), tariff losses of at least $63 billion, and projected declines in the relative value of exports, developing countries have little to gain from rushing to conclude Doha.
Download “Back to the Drawing Board” http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/Pubs/rp/RISPolicyBrief36DohaMay08.pdf
 Other GDAE publications with RIS: "Doha Round and Developing Countries: Will the Doha deal do more harm than good?" RIS Policy Brief #22, by Timothy A. Wise and Kevin P. Gallagher, April 2006."Relevance of ‘Policy Space’ for Development: Implications for Multilateral Trade Negotiations," by Nagesh Kumar and Kevin P. Gallagher, RIS Discussion Paper #120, March 2007.
 For more from GDAE on the Doha Round:http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/shrinking_gains.html
For more on GDAE’s Globalization and Sustainable Development Program:http://www.ase.tufts.edu/gdae/policy_research/globalization.html

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