Geneva talks focus on China's 15-year bid

The World Trade Organisation set out on Thursday on the final stretch of 15 years of negotiations for China to join the global trade regulator.

The WTO and China began talks in Geneva which are due to last until next Wednesday with a view to clearing most obstacles to membership by the time WTO ministers meet in Doha, Qatar, in November.

Beijing has concluded separate negotiations with the United States and European Union in the last few weeks, prompting optimism that China could join the 141-member trade body by the end of the year.

WTO director-general Mike Moore has urged all governments taking part in the discussions to make every effort at resolving outstanding issues. It is the first meeting of the working party on China's accession since January.

China's deputy trade minister Long Yong Tu expressed optimism on Thursday as he prepared to enter the negotiations.

"We have already a very comprehensive consensus with the US and the EU that creates very favorable conditions for this working party session, so we think we are going to have a very good session."

But WTO experts and the Chinese trade representative cautioned that there is still plenty of work left.

"There is still a lot of work to do, and there are hundreds of pages of legal documents to prepare," Long said.

"The Chinese say: You must eat your meal one mouthful at a time, and we must deal with the text paragraphe by paragraph."

It is hoped that the terms agreed to with the US and EU, the world's biggest trade powers, will enable China to "multilateralise" the accords with the WTO's other members, meaning that they accept the same conditions.

Under the deals, the EU and United States largely cleared some last hurdles with China, securing stronger commitments on access to Chinese markets and on agricultural subsidy levels.

The US had initially insisted that China be considered a developed country when it came to domestic support levels for its 900 million farmers.

Under the June 9 deal with Washington, China agreed to limit subsidies to 8.5 percent of the total value of agricultural production, rather than the 10 percent it originally sought.

Trade sources said Washington also secured a Chinese agreement to extend the 8.5-percent limit to another subsidy aimed at boosting agriculture in very poor regions of developing countries.

Long implied that the 8.5-percent level only established Beijing's status as developing nation.

"If you study carefully the agricultural agreement of the Uruguay Round, developed countries should not exceed five percent. So we (Chinese) have exceeded five percent," he said.

When asked if political issues had interfered in the WTO talks, the Chinese representative replied:"Trade is trade."

In the accord reached with the EU on June 20, a key point gave EU firms the right to freely choose Chinese partners for joint ventures, particularly in the telecommunications field.

Beijing and Brussels also agreed on greater access to Chinese markets for aviation, maritime, and transport insurance companies.

Distribution issues, important for European chain stores, was another point, and agreement was reached on a two-month deadline by which EU companies with licenses to operate in China would be entered in the trade registry, eliminating the possibility of long delays.

Long's EU counterpart, Pascal Lamy, gave Beijing a green light as the agreement was announced on June 21.

"The way is now clear for China to join the WTO in coming months," Lamy said in a statement.

China still has to sign a bilateral pact with Mexico and about five central American countries.

Discussions must also be completed on multilateral documents that explain in detail how China will implement its commitments to the WTO.

"We are going to deal with these issues in a very serious manner, we think the legal documents are important, we have to be very careful, very exact," Long said.

China hopes that approval for its WTO membership will be given at the trade body's ministerial conference in Doha in November.

But this would not mark the end of the process.

The documents would then have to be formally approved by the WTO's ruling executive body, ratified by the Chinese People's Congress and only 30 days after Beijing sends its notification back to WTO headquarters would China officially take up its place.

"Since we have been in the exercise for 15 years, we are not worried about one month earlier or later," Long noted.