Trade Talks Fail Over Farm Subsidies
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POTSDAM, Germany (AP) – Trade talks among the World Trade Organization’s four most powerful members have failed because of their inability to agree on farm subsidy cuts, Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said Thursday.
“It was useless to continue the discussions based on the numbers that were on the table,” Mr. Amorim said at a news conference.
The talks had been described as crucial in the WTO’s drive to complete a new global trade pact by the end of the year.
The current round of global talks aims to add billions of dollars to the world economy and lift millions of people out of poverty through new trade flows. But negotiations have struggled since their inception six years ago, largely because of wrangling between rich and poor countries over eliminating barriers to agricultural trade.
