Agricultural trade : what matters in the Doha round ?, Vol. 1 of 1

About

Countries

Data & Research

Learning

News

Projects & Operations

Publications

Topics

Home > Data & Research > Document Search > Report Details

Agricultural trade : what matters in the Doha round ?

Author:	Laborde, David; Martin, Will;	Collection Title:	Policy Research working paper ; no. WPS 6261
Country:	World;	Date Stored:	2012/11/13
Document Date:	2012/11/01	Document Type:	Policy Research Working Paper
Language:	English	Major Sector:	Industry and trade
Rel. Proj ID:	1W-Agricultural Trade Reform -- -- P116383;	Region:	The World Region
Report Number:	WPS6261	Sub Sectors:	Other domestic and international trade
SubTopics:	Emerging Markets; Economic Theory & Research; Agribusiness; Free Trade; Trade Policy	TF No/Name:	TF012828-Agricultural Trade and Food Security
Volume No:	1 of 1

Summary: This survey concludes that including agriculture in the Doha Agenda negotiations was important both economically and politically, although the political resistance to reform is particularly strong in this sector. While agriculture accounts for less than 10 percent of merchandise trade, high and variable agricultural distortions appear to cause the majority of the cost of distortions to global merchandise trade. Within agriculture, most of the costs appear to arise from trade barriers levied on imports since these barriers tend to be high, variable across time and over products, and are levied by a wide range of countries. The negotiations faced a need for balance between discipline in reducing tariffs and hence creating the market access gains that are central to the negotiations, and flexibility in managing political pressures. While the approach of providing flexibility on a certain percentage of tariff lines is seriously flawed, the proposed Modalities still appear to provide worthwhile market access. Better ways appear to be needed to deal with developing countries' concerns about food price volatility while reducing the collective-action problems resulting from price insulation.


Official Documents Official, scanned versions of documents (may include signatures, etc.)
File Type		Description	File Size (mb)

	PDF 39 pages	Official version*	2.73 (approx.)
	Text	Text version**

	See documents related to this project

* The official version is derived from scanning the final, paper copy of the document and is the official,
archived version including all signatures, charts, etc.

** The text version is the OCR text of the final scanned version and is not an accurate representation of the final text.
It is provided solely to benefit users with slow connectivity.

Permanent URL for this page: http://go.worldbank.org/UI9BGQV9Y0