Doha Round: clock ticking

A ministerial meeting on tariff and subsidy cuts in farm and industrial goods -- otherwise known as 'non-agricultural market access', or NAMA -- is being planned in Geneva for the coming weeks.  Everybody's clock-watching: last week, Brazil's foreign minister Celso Amorim said there must be a broad agreement by end-June or early July at the latest if the Doha round were to be concluded before a new US president takes office in January 2009, after which any agreement could be derailed indefinitely.

The worsening economic situation has added to uncertainty and reinforced protectionist impulses. And the Bush administration has neither negotiating authority nor political leverage, while the elections will delay US action on any Doha package.

A ministerial meeting will most likely take place in July. Swiss authorities have refused to host such a ministerial in June given that Switzerland is hosting the European soccer tournament, and security forces will be occupied with the event.