NAIROBI, Sept 5: The United States and the European Union are committed to advancing free trade in agricultural produce, the new head of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) said on Thursday.

Supachai Panitchpakdi, the first official from a developing country to head a global economic body, said Western leaders backed the Doha Round of WTO negotiations last year, which agreed to reduce trade barriers to farmers in poorer countries by 2004.

The former deputy prime minister of Thailand told reporters that although delegates at the Earth Summit in Johannesburg did not discuss reducing farm subsidies in the developed world in detail, leaders had shown commitment to pursuing negotiations.

“The President of the EU (Romano) Prodi confirmed the EU’s involvement in agriculture negotiations, the US Secretary of State (Colin) Powell also confirmed the commitment to the need to advance the process of free trade,” Supachai told reporters in Nairobi.

“I am encouraged also that our Doha programme has been elevated to the global level because of the summit. Of course this (summit) was not a negotiation forum so there was no discussion on how much subsidies would be reduced.”

The developing world wants rich nations to reduce farm subsidies which act as barriers to exports from poor countries.

The United Nations estimates that farm subsidies in developed nations total more than $300 billion a year, against aid disbursements of some $54 billion.

The United States has been criticised for a new Farm Bill set to boost subsidies. In Europe, radical plans to overhaul the subsidy system are bitterly opposed by countries including France and Spain.

Supachai, who took over last weekend as director-general of the 144-country WTO from former New Zealand Prime Minister Mike Moore, said he wanted to see Africans participate more strongly in WTO negotiations.

He said the WTO had set up a training course in Kenya and in Morocco aimed at helping African countries participate as effectively as possible in WTO talks.

“I cannot go in there and negotiate on behalf of developing countries, but we can help with training and giving them the capacity to conduct their own negotiations,” Supachai said.

Earlier, in an interview the WTO chief said a freer world trade system would do more to help poor countries than official aid from industrialised nations, newly installed global trade supremo Supachai Panitchpakdi said here on Thursday.

Supachai, who took over as director general of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Monday from New Zealand’s Mike Moore, said removal of trade barriers such as agricultural and fishery subsidies would be cheaper for rich nations than official development aid (ODA).

According to World Bank estimates, the abolition of all trade barriers could boost global income by $2.8 trillion over 10 years. Developing countries stand to gain more than half that amount, and the world would have 320 million fewer poor people by 2015.

ODA, meanwhile, has fallen to 0.22 per cent of rich nations’ gross national product and the United Nations has urged donor nations to double it to $100 billion a year.

The message is clear: freer trade is more important than official aid and will bring more benefit to developing countries in the long run, Supachai said after the conclusion of the UN Earth Summit here.

Trade liberalisation is a powerful ally of sustainable development. This one action, opening up markets, will make a huge difference to the lives of millions. Developing countries’ share of world trade currently stands at around 30 percent and more must be done to boost market access for their products, he added.—Reuters/AFP