Developing countries have called for "important changes" to the World Trade Organisation's attempt to relaunch deadlocked global trade talks by an end-July deadline, it emerged Thursday.
The G-20 group of developing countries said in dicussions this week that the draft proposals on agriculture put forward by the WTO's chief negotiator last Friday favoured the demands of wealthy countries.
In a statement on behalf of the G-20, Brazil said the document needed "important changes and improvements" before they could accept it.
The statement obtained by AFP said "there is a clear imbalance between certain major points that are guaranteed at the outset for developed countries and other points of fundamental importance for developing countries."
The G-20, which includes Brazil, China and India, added that the trade-off did not leave a "corresponding level of comfort for us".
It also criticised the failure to grant special attention to cotton, where African countries and Brazil are at loggerheads with the United States over subsidies that they blame for pricing their cotton out of world markets.
The talks among the WTO's 147 members have been deadlocked since ministers from rich and poor countries clashed in Cancun, Mexico last year, and there was little sign that the gap had been bridged 10 months later.
French President Jacques Chirac on Wednesday dismissed the WTO proposal as "unacceptable" in its current form, notably in its call for an end to agricultural export subsidies.
"This proposal is profoundly unbalanced to the detriment of the interests of the European Union," he said, as he also targeted the weakness of the document on farming export credits that are used by the United States.
Washington has not reacted to the proposals so far.
The compromise, which must be endorsed by July 30, is regarded as an essential step before full-blown negotiations on reducing trade barriers, which were launched in the Qatari capital Doha in November 2001, can go ahead.
Chief agriculture negotiator Tim Groser said he would amend the text before a key meeting of the WTO's ruling General Council begins on July 27.
The development aid charity Oxfam International on Thursday accused rich countries of undermining global trade talks, as it echoed the G-20's criticism in a report entitled "One Minute to Midnight".
"Developing countries are being put in the untenable position of having to choose either to agree to a watered down framework or to accept the blame for the collapse of the talks," said Celine Charveriat of Oxfam.
"Time is running out. Despite pledges of reform, rich countries have pursued a strategy based on self-interest and consistently blamed everyone else for potential deadlock," Charveriat said.
The report demanded tougher wording on tariff barriers that might hamper imports from poor countries.
It also criticised attention given in the text to the European Union and a mainly wealthy group of net farm importers, such as Japan and Switzerland, who are demanding special treatment on some produce to protect their smallholders.
Oxfam said the framework did not recognise the right of developing countries to protect the livelihoods of impoverished rural communities in a similar way.
Britain's Development Minister, Hilary Benn, warned Wednesday that developing countries might lose faith in the WTO trading system if its members failed to reach an agreement next week.
"It is the richest WTO members that need to make the greatest movement in the negotiations," he said.
The EU -- which includes Britain and France -- is meant to act as a group in the trade talks. The EU's Commission said this week that the WTO proposal needed changes but did not reject it.Agence France Presse:
