HELSINKI, Oct 22: The head of the World Trade Organization said on Saturday that the positions of the United States and the European Union over market access were too far apart to hold out the prospect of any advance at forthcoming talks.

“While we have seen some progress on agriculture, positions are still too far apart on one issue, which is market access, to allow negotiations to proress,” Pascal Lamy told a conference in Helsinki of the Parliamentary Network on the World Bank, to which more than 800 lawmakers from 110 countries belong.

“What we need now is this market access part of the negotiations to move, and it has to move very rapidly if we want to keep any chance for Hong Kong to succeed,” Lamy said by video conference call from Geneva.

Delegates from the 148 WTO member states are due to meet in Hong Kong from December 13 to 18 to try to reach a deal on trade liberalization in the context of the Doha round.

The Doha round, launched in 2001, was supposed to have been completed by the end of 2004 but progress has been blocked by disagreement on the issue of farm subsidies paid by rich countries — in particular the US and the EU — which developing countries want eliminated.

Consultations between member states have entered a concrete phase and now relate to figures, Lamy said.

Washington has put forward a proposal to cut aid to US farmers by 60 per cent, but poorer states say this is not enough to help their producers.

At the same time the US has called for 80pc cuts in aid to EU and Japanese farmers. Tokyo has rejected the plan, while the EU will not go beyond 70pc.

And while Washington wants duties on agricultural products cut by between 55 per cent and 90 per cent, Brussels will not go beyond reductions of 20 per cent to 55 per cent.

“If Hong Kong fails, then the chance for the round to be finished in 2006 become very slim and if it is not finished in 2006, there will be no result of the negotiation, this is a prospect which I hope is bleak enough to mobilize energies but there are very few days left,” Lamy said.

Lamy said that Saudi Arabia could be admitted to the Geneva-based group this year, but appeared to rule out Ukraine joining by the end of 2005.

Both countries have said they aim to join the 148-nation world trade body this year.

“Saudi Arabia could still join this year if the final rush which is taking place next week, does bring the agreement,” Lamy told the conference.

WTO sources told Reuters earlier this month the world’s largest oil producer had moved close to entry this year after completing a package of documents setting out the terms of its membership. These would be submitted to a key meeting on Oct 28, the sources added.

On Ukraine, which has been pushing for membership by the end of 2005, Lamy said: “I know Ukraine’s objective ... I don’t think it is going to happen. What I know from the stage of negotiations, is that it will not happen. Not least because for procedural reasons we won’t have time.”—Agencies