Current assessment of the prospects of the Uruguay Round

Abstract

THIS paper outlines the progress in the Uruguay Round, on issues seen as important by PECC countries - although inevitably from an Australian perspective. It does not try to assess the prospects for the success of the Round. The Uruguay Round was scheduled to conclude at a Ministerial Meeting held in Brussels from December 3-7 1990, but the meeting was unable to reach its objective primarily because no agreement was reached on how to engage in negotiations on agriculture. According to the chair-man the 'participants needed more time to reconsider their positions in some key areas of the negotiations'. After intensive informal consultations led by the Director-General of the GAIT, Arthur Dunkel, negotiations formally resumed on February 26, 1991, but on technical questions only. The focus on technical issues rather than major policy matters was partly due to the need for Congressional reconsideration of the current US negotiating mandate. It also provided a reasonable 'cooling off' period, and an opportunity for work to be done which, even if the Brussels meeting had been more successful, would have been necessary.