Background Briefing on World Trade Organization Ministerial in Doha

11:16 A.M. EST

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Thank you very much. I appreciate all of you coming today. I thought that I would start by saying a few things about the preparations and the perspective that we have more or less on the eve of this fourth ministerial meeting of the WTO, which will take place in Doha, Qatar, the 9th to the 13th of November. What I thought I would do is talk a little bit about the preparation, a little bit about the stakes involved, and then talk about our view of what the agenda for negotiations looks like, and then we can go to questions and answers.

I think the thing that I'd like to start out by saying is that we still have a lot of hard negotiating to do in the next 10 days. But I think it's fair to say that our ability to launch a new set of international trade negotiations is within our collective grasp, within the collective grasp of the WTO members. We haven't clenched it in our hands yet, but it's certainly within reach, and I'd like to talk a little bit about why I believe that that's the case.

First of all, I think what we're quite a bit better positioned at this point for the fourth ministerial, compared to the comparable point before Seattle, and there are a number of reasons for that, one of which, of course, is simply having failed once, people are more determined to have a success at this meeting. But beyond that, there have been a number of lessons that were learned from Seattle and that people have really incorporated into the way we've operated, especially in the last year.

The approach that we're taking is that a declaration has been developed, a draft declaration, been developed in Geneva in a different way than it was developed prior to Seattle. Going into Seattle, we had a lot of contributions from individual countries, but it didn't really hang together as a cohesive document. So what's been going on this time is the chairman of the General Council, who is Hong Kong's ambassador to the WTO, Stuart Harbinson, he has been conducting a process of through more or less successive approximations, trying to come up with a consensus document that he drafted -- not being -- you know, having four different versions of investment language provided by four different delegations, and three different versions of services language, but going for a single document.

And he has produced his second draft of that after very, very extensive consultations with countries on his first draft. So he's trying to find the common ground and then see, through additional adjustments, whether we're able to negotiate a consensus document. So that's the process, and that's a different process than occurred at Seattle.

Also, it's a much shorter document. People learned at Seattle that we're really just launching negotiations. We're not trying to complete negotiations or conduct a detailed negotiation. So let's not pre-negotiate all of the details. And so this is document that to get the negotiations launched and to set a framework or an agenda for negotiations. And everybody's been tempted to do a little pre- negotiating, but I think, by and large, people have kept with this broader framework as the appropriate one.

Another thing that is different is that there has been earlier and much more extensive involvement by ministers. There have been a large number of different informal meetings with ministers. I think that you all are very familiar with the informal ministerial that was held in -- right around Labor Day in Mexico City, with a group of -- a very representative group of countries, and more recently in Singapore. But those are only two. The Cairns Group had a meeting in Punta del Este, and a number of non-Cairns Group ministers went to meet with them, including Ambassador Zoellick and Secretary Veneman. The least developed ministers have met in Zanzibar in July. Of course, APEC has met, and just two days ago we had many of the ministers from Africa here for the AGOA forum.

So there's been ministerial involvement, which means that they're involved with the substance. But they also have been developing working relationships, which are going to be crucial when we actually get to the ministerial.

I'd mention two other factors that I think put us in a better position. One is, cooperation between the United States and European Union has been completely different going into this ministerial, compared to Seattle. We -- yes, we have our differences, and some important differences on matters in the WTO, but we share a commitment and a strategic goal of getting negotiations launched.

And that has been kind of our point of reference as we've tried to work through our individual differences. So we have been pulling, in a macro sense, in the same direction. And that doesn't mean that we dictate to the other 140 members, but without our working together, it's very, very difficult -- it's really impossible to launch something like this. So that's a difference.

And then finally, I would point to the global economic situation. It's a very different global economic situation and it's very sobering to countries. And so I think that all of us realize that the stakes involved in launching further trade liberalization are higher, and this, I think, contributes to people's willingness to take seriously the need to accommodate each other's essential interests.

So for all of these reasons, I think that we're in a better position than we were going into Seattle. It does not mean that success is assured; it never is when you have 142 countries trying to negotiate something. That's an awful lot of interests to accommodate, and -- so you never have -- you're never going to have a guarantee of success. But I don't think there are any doubts in people's minds as to why they're going to Doha, and it's clear that we are going there to launch negotiations.

One other thing I would note, since I've been talking about comparisons between Seattle and Doha -- and I mentioned the failure in Seattle -- but that has not diminished the interest in countries in being part of the WTO; so that when we sit down in Doha, there will be 14 additional countries there with us who were not members of the WTO at Seattle. And in fact, one of the things that, of course, will be important in Doha, is that we expect that some additional countries will be joining; that we certainly expect China and Taiwan China to be joining, and Vanuatu will be joining.

So -- but, you know, that actually shows that from very large countries to the smallest countries, they feel that it's important to be part of this organization and the structure of rules and obligations and benefits that flow from being a member.

Just a minute or two on the benefits. You know, there's been a lot of attention, as there should be, to the fact that so many of the countries in the WTO -- probably three-quarters of them -- are developing countries.

And so the question is often asked, well, what's at stake for developing countries, what's their interest in this? I think there are a number of ways to demonstrate that. One is to just look at what has happened to developing country trade since the Uruguay Round. And what has happened is, exports from developing countries have increased $1 trillion since the Uruguay Round. They now export about $2.4 trillion. So that's a very, very substantial increase.

Q (Off mike.)

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Yeah. Yeah. Since the Uruguay Round.

Q (Off mike.)

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Yeah. I'm sorry. That's right.

The other thing is that there's all sorts of evidence of how a more open trading regime helps a developing country. And I would just point to two examples of that. One comes from studies that have been done by the World Bank, where they look at what developing countries have had as their trade regimes over the last 60 years. And they divide the countries into two groups, one they call globalizing economies -- developing economies that open their markets and allow competition, and then non-globalizing developing countries. And it's very striking, the difference. If you look at these two groups over the entire decade of the '90s, what you'll see is, for the globalizing developing countries, their per-capita income has increased 5.1 percent per year. If you look at the non-globalizing, their per- capita income has fallen 1.1 percent per year. And, you know, when you starting thinking about the population growth in these countries, that's a striking difference when you see the per capita is growing that differently.

The other is, just to take two examples -- and this is oversimplifying somewhat, but if you look at the situations of Korea and Ghana and what has happened to them over the last -- basically over the last 30 years, 30 years ago Korea had a per-capita income of about $500, and Ghana had a per-capita income of about $800. Korea has followed more of a globalizing trade and economic path than Ghana has, and so today you see that the per-capita income in Korea is over $10,000, and Ghana's per-capita income has actually declined in constant dollars, to $370. This is a very striking comparison. And there are other things happening in those economies, obviously, but there is a big difference between developing countries that take advantage of the international trading system and those who try to insulate themselves from it.

Let me talk more specifically about the ministerial and what it is that we anticipate, what kind of a set of negotiations we're trying to launch. At the core of this agenda for negotiations is the traditional sort of market-access issues, a lot of attention, obviously, to agriculture.

This is very important because opening up agriculture, liberalizing agriculture has been behind liberalization of industrial products over the theory -- over the history of the GATT and of the WTO. And a start was really made in the Uruguay Round to open up agriculture more, but clearly much more needs to be done. And you can just look at the difference in tariff levels, that the average tariff levels in -- (inaudible) -- levels, that is the ones that countries are permitted to have, are up over 50 percent in agriculture, and they're below five percent, on average, in industrial products.

So that is just one example of the imbalance, really, in openness. So agriculture clearly is a core element for market access negotiations in this round. But we also are going to be negotiating liberalization for industrial products as well. And there's virtual unanimity on the point of market access. Not in the details of it, but these are the core of our negotiations.

Services, more important for all of our economies, including many of the developing countries -- that also will be part of the market access liberalization negotiations. Other areas -- government procurement, at least introducing the element of transparency in government procurement, and also something that's called trade facilitation, which is basically dealing with, how are goods treated as they come across the border, the customs procedures dealing with rules of origin and things like that.

So this is really the core of negotiations. And from the standpoint of the United States, frankly, that would be a satisfactory outcome for us, if we were able to initiate negotiations on these five subjects that I mentioned. But as I said, this is a negotiation involving 140 countries with different interests, and all of us have to accommodate to others' interests, obviously without hurting our own national interests.

So other areas are being discussed, and I would say they're more controversial. For example, the issue of whether there should be negotiations on investment discipline. And it appears that there are a number of countries, such as Japan and the European Union and Korea, that think that it is important to start negotiations on some basic rules of investment, perhaps transparency and non-discrimination and things of that nature.

Many countries are concerned that they're not prepared to embark on negotiations at this stage. They understand the importance of the issue. And many countries would probably need some technical assistance in capacity building to help them negotiate in this area. So this is one the issues that will have to be discussed: Can we start some degree of negotiations? Should we do it immediately? Should there be a period of -- further period of preparation before we do that?

A second subject that is similar to that is competition policy, and this is an area in which also there are sharp differences in countries' familiarity with the subject. Many countries at this point do not have a basic antitrust or competition policy law or authority, for that matter, and so they're, understandably, hesitant to jump into a negotiation at this stage on even very basic principles for competition policy. On the other hand, others feel that there is a need to have this as a component of the international trade discipline; after all, I mean, we certainly -- the United States has seen examples where we thought that we had markets open, and then we get into those markets and find that there are anticompetitive practices. So this is another one where we have to find the balance between moving forward on something, and yet doing it in a way that all of the countries feel that they can participate.

Another issue, even more controversial, of course, is the issue of environment. Now, there are certain parts of the environment agenda that are less controversial than others. I think there's widespread support for recognizing that we need to go about our negotiations in a way that is compatible with fostering sustainable development, the nexus between the economy and the environment and environmental protection.

I think there's also widespread support for seeking an improved market access for environmental goods and services. Of course the United States and a number of other countries feel that it would be important for us to address subsidies that exist both in agriculture and in fisheries, and that in doing so, we would be addressing both trade-distorting practices and environmentally damaging practices. These are a number of the less controversial aspects of environment.

There is, as you know, a committee on trade and the environment within the WTO.

I think there's widespread support for promoting a strong agenda for that group in the coming year.

Then we get to some of the more controversial issues -- some of those that Europe, in particular, has been espousing, and these will be very difficult issues for us to deal with. The Europeans feel that it's desirable to clarify some of the WTO provisions with respect to certain environmental policies, and particularly their use of this (precaution/caution ?) principle. There's an awful lot of concern about that, that that can easily be used in a protectionist way, and so that will be one of the more difficult issues under negotiation there.

A number of other issues are up for discussion. I've mentioned capacity building. This will certainly get a much higher profile than in other rounds, much more explicit attention, given the number of -- the large number of developing countries that do need to increase their institutional strength. I don't think they need institutional strength in negotiating; they're all very good negotiators, but in terms of actually implementing obligations and really understanding what the obligations are that they are signing onto. So capacity building will be a lot more explicit in this launching than in others.

There is -- we are working -- all of us are working on a -- we hope to have a separate declaration on the relationship between the intellectual property part of the WTO,that is the TRIPS, and efforts by countries to address the sorts of pandemics that we have seen, such as HIV/AIDS and malaria and tuberculosis. The people who negotiate the TRIPS -- who negotiated the TRIPS -- that small group of intellectual property experts -- they know very well what is in the TRIPS and the flexibility that the TRIPS allow to a country to address a national health emergency. It's not widely known elsewhere, and so there's a lot of concern about whether, in fact, countries are constrained unduly by the TRIPS' obligations. And so there's a feeling that, at a minimum, we should clarify that in a public way and give countries and the public the confidence that, in fact, the protection of intellectual property, as provided in the WTO, can be respected, and countries can still effectively respond to these sorts of health emergencies or other health emergencies that may come up in the future.

And this is something that has been very important for the United States, and we discussed this at length the last few days that the African ministers are here -- were here. And I think that we have a number of proposals that we have made that really address this issue, we think, quite effectively. And frankly, we got rather a positive response from the African ministers who were here, and I would like to at some point in the course of today describe those initiatives for you.

There will be a number of other -- I'll just quickly finish up -- you're aware of this notion of implementation, where developing countries have expressed concern about the way in which the provisions of the Uruguay Round have worked out or have been implemented or, in their view, perhaps not implemented in the way they envisioned. There's been a very extensive process in Geneva, going through, I think, some 90 proposals along these lines, to clarify things. But frankly, some of the proposals have gone beyond clarifying and suggested actually rewriting or changing the sets of obligations, and that's really something that can only be done through a negotiation.

So I would expect at Doha we would have a large number of decisions on these implementation matters that we can deal with right now, and then there will be a process for countries to pursue those measures that really are negotiable measures. They would be able to do those in the ongoing negotiations or the other work of the WTO.

There are other issues. Some people would like to clarify certain other rules within the WTO. I think that there is unanimity that any clarification of other rules should not upset the basic concepts and principles of those rules. Certainly we feel that way.

I think that is -- that's pretty much it. I may have missed a few of the items, but I think these are the principal items that will be examined, be part of the negotiating agenda, and, we hope, included successfully in a ministerial declaration or declarations.

MODERATOR: (Off mike.)

Q Jim Berger from Washington Trade Daily. I don't think it's in the declaration -- I haven't heard you mention it -- the length of the new round. Is that decided, or what is the U.S. view? Should it be three years, five years?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: That is something that will have to be decided by the ministers. We believe that we should be looking for a shorter, rather than a longer, period. And something on the order of three years seems to us to be a reasonable enough time to complete the work and yet keeping the pressure on to complete it.

Q Nancy Dunne, Financial Times. You didn't mention anti- dumping.

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Oh, I mentioned that there were some people who thought that certain rules should be clarified. (Laughter.)

Q (Laughs.) Oh! (Laughter.) Right. Well, I take it you don't think so. I --

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, the funny thing about it is, you know, the United States has had its share of anti-dumping duties imposed upon us. But I'm sorry, go ahead with your question.

Q Oh. So that means you'd be willing to negotiate over anti- dumping rules?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, nobody that I know of is saying that we should renegotiate the basic principles and aspects of the dumping agreements, or actually any of the other Uruguay Round agreements. A number of countries would like to clarify certain things. We certainly are prepared to listen to what countries' concerns are. We think that before one gets into negotiation, you need to frame issues properly.

By the way, we probably have some issues that we would want to frame, that there are certain -- one of the things I should mention is that the phenomenon in the last several years has been that dumping is used by more and more countries, and frankly, not all of those countries have the same sort of transparency and due process that we have in our dumping procedures. And there's a reason, actually, that countries are using these increasingly, and I think the United States actually is an example of that, in the following sense. As the normal trade barriers, tariffs and quotas, are reduced or eliminated, then an economy becomes more vulnerable to unfair trade practices. And people recognize that.

So there does have to be discipline, effective discipline for these -- against these unfair trade practices. And so what's happening is more and more countries are realizing that. And we certainly have an interest in ensuring that countries have the same high standards of transparency and due process that we have. Frankly we certainly would like to have more discipline on the underlying unfair trade practices themselves.

Q (Off mike) -- more discipline, the it implements its dumping laws?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: I think the first step would be to get countries up to our level of discipline.

But a lot of the things that we do, frankly, we do them not because they're WTO obligations, but because of our system of governance and the whole administrative procedures act and things like that. And so frankly if we could get all countries to operate at that level of transparency and due process, we'd all be better off.

Q (Off mike.) Oh, sorry, it's Corba Daley (ph) from AFX News. Wouldn't you need to have that on the agenda to get them up to that speed?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Oh, well there -- I mean there are different ways to have that on the agenda. One can do it in a negotiating way. There are these committees on the different codes, and those committees continue to work. So there's -- you know, it could be done in that or it could be done in some combination of working committees and subsequent negotiations with them. But there are a number of formulas to do it.

Q In point of fact -- Rich Thomas of Newsweek Magazine. In point of fact, the U.S. has lost a number of WTO cases that go to both our anti-dumping rules, but particularly countervailing duties and the whole panoply of our trade protection measures, and are these not going to be subject to any of these negotiations? People are now free to -- Europe particularly is now able to retaliate in half a dozen different areas in cases that they've won here. And is this going to be completely excluded from the negotiations? Or how to resolve these issues? If it was Damocles' Sword, all just going to be left hanging forever?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, first of all, will all due respect, I think that the situation is not exactly as you described it. We have certainly lost a number of WTO dispute-settlement cases. But, those cases have by and large dealt with certain procedural things which we have been able to go back and correct. And I do not believe that we have had to withdraw any dumping duties or countervailing duties as a result of such cases.

So the underlying integrity of our trade remedy laws has not been upset by cases. I mean, you know, these are highly procedural activities and provisions. And so just think in terms of comparison with our own U.S. courts system, is that it's very easy for governments to, as they're pursuing something, to make a procedural misstep which then gets corrected, and in the future, you use a different procedure, but it doesn't undermine the basic law, in this case obligations that it would have.

Q Yes, I'm Jose Puerta (ph) from (France ?) Press. Mr. Zoellick told us last Tuesday that the U.S. delegation has been reduced to 1/3 of what was originally planned because of security concerns. And now the Washington Post this morning tells us that the concerns are so serious that even some members of Congress have decided not to go, and there are even evacuation plans for the U.S. delegation. Can you share with us what you know about this?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, I think first of all, there's probably not a person in this room whose daily behavior today and environment is exactly the same as it was two months ago. I mean, we all have had to adjust to a brand new situation, which certainly in the United States we have not had to deal with in any of our lifetimes. So, we are -- we certainly evaluate the situation, and I think everybody realizes that the situation in that region is a different situation than we've had before any of these other ministerials. And it was our judgment that we should look to see what is the tightest-sized delegation to get the job done. And so that's what we have done. And I think that, you know, everybody is evaluating what is appropriate for them, and I don't find it surprising that members of Congress have decided, some of them have decided that it would make more sense to stay here.

And let must just say one thing about that, and that is we recognize that this is a very different situation, and whether it's a member of Congress or someone else on an interagency team or the private sector or NGOs, that it's not going to be possible for as many people to be on site as there have been at other conferences like this. And so what we are doing at USTR is we are putting in place really an unprecedented system for communication back and forth between Washington and Doha, and from Washington to all of the interested parties.

We are -- we will be setting up a system of daily live briefings with people here in Washington. And we are also going to do something we've never done before, which is webcasting. And -- so that that way we will be able to have people in Doha that we will be able to interact that way, or at least convey the situation to people back here and not just the interagency group, but as I said, to our advisors and to NGOs and so forth. And so we think that this will also help people to feel comfortable with the idea that, even if they are not on site, they are very much plugged in to what is happening.

Q On that, there seems to be a concern, though, that the U.S. government is providing a certain level of information on the threat to members of Congress and less of a level of information to American business groups, NGOs, journalists. Can you say -- those who are going, should they show up with gas masks, special medicine, and a radio to get -- to be evacuated? What can you tell us about -- what level of threat should those expect?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, first of all, with respect to the briefings, we have provided classified briefings to all of those who have the appropriate clearance. And that includes not just our U.S. government delegates, but -- executive branch delegates, but it includes members of Congress and their staffs. And it includes, by the way, our cleared advisors. I think you all know we have a very extensive system of official advisors. These people all have security clearances so that they can advise us on confidential matters. But that does enable them also to have this briefing.

And, you know, the range of people -- I think there's something like over 1,000 people in our network of advisors, and they range from private sector businesses to NGOs, environmental groups, labor unions are among our cleared advisors, agricultural groups, consumer groups. So it's really actually a very wide range of people who would be likely to go to the ministerial.

We also did something that we have not done in the past, again because times have changed. We gave an unclassified briefing to those other groups that do not have the clearance. And, you know, we are trying to help people make difficult decisions. Every one of us who's involved in this has a difficult decision to make, and we're doing our best to, on the one hand, provide as much information as we can under the law to people, and on the other as I said earlier, to establish a system of communication during the conference so that people feel that they have as much involvement as possible.

Q On this -- (inaudible) -- with Inside U.S. Trade. On this TRIPS and public health, the developing countries have a proposal that the ministers would agree to a statement that says nothing in the TRIPS agreement stands in the way of public health.

But the U.S. opposes this. Can you explain why and tell us what in the TRIPS agreement could stand in the way of public health?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Okay, sure. First of all, there are more countries than just the United States who feel that the expression that you just articulated is not a desirable one. And here's the reason why.

The statement that you said, you said nothing in the TRIPS could prevent a country from responding to public health, something along those lines. That is an enormous exception. What that means is that anybody, any government, could stand up and say public health -- I can violate any part of the TRIPS that I want. It means that not only could they produce pharmaceuticals, but they could deny this -- or violate, I should say, the patent on any kind of medical equipment. They could violate the copyright of medical software. They could violate the copyright of medical textbooks, you know? They say, Gee, well, why should we have to pay royalties for medical textbooks for our medical schools? Why don't we just say "public health" and we'll -- you know, the heck with the copyright? So -- and you can imagine how damaging this would be, frankly, to even just normal public health deliveries.

The problem really originated in the areas of these pandemics such as HIV/AIDS and malaria and tuberculosis, and poor countries wanting to be confident that they were able to provide medicines to their people at a reasonable price and in sufficient quantity. Now, there are a number of things that they can do under the TRIPS to enable them to do that.

You know, if you have a -- if you really have a national health emergency, you can compulsory license; the TRIPS doesn't prevent you from doing that. You can parallel import; the TRIPS doesn't prevent you from doing that. There are a number of things that you can do. And as I said earlier, the United States, trying to respond to these concerns of these countries, has put forward two additional proposals. One is that for the least developed countries in the world -- now, they don't really have any pharmaceutical patent obligations as it is until 2006. So, I mean, they can -- you know, they can import pharmaceuticals from, you know, generics, or they could produce them if they have that capability, without respect to patents until 2006 anyway. What we have said is we're prepared to give them an additional transition of another decade, so that they would not have these obligations until the year 2016.

Now, sub-Saharan Africa is an area where the AIDS issue and a number of these other pandemics has been particularly bad. And so in addition to the least developed, what we would do is for the sub- Saharan African countries, we would have a five-year moratorium on any WTO dispute settlements dealing with pharmaceutical patents in situations where countries are addressing real national health emergencies. And it just really isn't reasonable to say that someone gets a complete sort of "get out of jail free" card, that all they have to do is say public health, and they can do whatever they want. And frankly, the African countries, they're concerned about addressing these pandemics. And they responded very positively to this 10-year transition extension for the least developed, and a five-year moratorium on WTO dispute settlements on pharmaceutical patent issues for the other sub-Saharan African countries.

There needs to be a distinction made between countries that are trying to address a national health emergency and countries that are trying to promote their generic drug producers to be able to export to other countries. That is what is one of the motives behind countries that support that language that you suggested -- no, you didn't suggest it. I mean, you just repeated it.

Q (Off mike.)

Q Can I just follow up on that, because the argument is -- from the health point of view is that to get the drugs affordable, you need generic competition --

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Okay.

Q -- if the patent is a monopoly. So once 2006 kicks in, India's no longer going to be able to produce all these generics that it does now that are available. Where are these countries in Africa going to be able to get this alternative source, because they don't have the capacity to make their own?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Some of them don't. I mean, some do, certainly. Well, the least developed at this point don't. Well, one of the things is that this allows us to look at this issue, you know, with additional time. There are issues that have been raised, particularly in the poorer countries and the least developed countries.

And, you know, one of the things about our proposal is that it can encourage generic manufacturers to locate in sub-Saharan Africa. But the point is, these are very complicated issues, and what our concern is that we not jump on some bandwagon and open up a brand new loophole in the TRIPS as we try to address a particular issue. For example, the issue of least developed, and can they continue to get drugs from outside their country by compulsory licensing or whatever, we will have time to do that. And in fact, the TRIPS (council/counsel ?) -- part of what is in the declaration right now is that the TRIPS (council/counsel ?) would look at that issue and provide a recommendation in a very short period of time.

So we think that by providing the combination of the moratorium and the transition, that we will be able to work through whatever remaining issues there are. We'll also be able to see how the Global Trust Fund works and whether, in fact, you know, the problems are as great as people fear.

The other thing is, going back to the point about the Brazilian proposal that you mentioned, is that none of these drugs are going to come forth in the future if there isn't an incentive for this research. And that's the balance we have to find. We've got to find a balance that provides an incentive for drug companies to produce these drugs, to develop the drugs -- and it's enormously expensive costs of development -- and yet allows countries to be able to meet its needs. And we think that our proposal does that, that's the better balance.

Q Jim Cox, from USA Today. There are reports that the president and the emir of Qatar have spoken recently, maybe even today. Could you shed any light on the substance of that? And could you also tell us whether the subject of cancelling, postponing or moving the WTO meeting was raised, and whether there's any chance of that happening?

Thank you.

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: I'm not aware of any calls between our president and the emir of Qatar -- (off mike) -- I'm not aware of any such calls.

We feel that Qatari officials are taking every possible step to provide a safe and secure conference. Obviously, this is their uppermost concern. And we are taking steps, as are other delegations, to provide security for our delegation.

We're preparing to go to Qatar, and we're confident that we are going to have a successful conference.

Q Rik Winkel, Financielle Dagblad. How much of a problem is it for you to go to Doha without trade promotion authority? And when do you expect Congress to grant TPA?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Certainly trade promotion authority is an important ingredient in U.S. leadership in this area, and having trade promotion authority is important for our leadership.

As for Congress and when it will pass trade promotion authority, these days, with the way the schedule is so unpredictable, it would be very hard for me to predict their schedule for getting to trade promotion authority.

Obviously, it is a high priority for the administration, and we are confident that Congress will see how important it is and will provide a good, strong trade promotion authority.

MODERATOR: (Off mike.)

Q My name is Dmitri (Slogarev ?). I am from Russian Tass News Agency, and I have a question about Russia. First of all, how long this ministerial will be? And will Russia be able -- join this meeting?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: The meeting is from the 9th to the 13th, and countries that have indicated a desire to join the WTO can be there as observers.

MODERATOR: The gentleman way in the back.

Q Hi. Doug Palmer with Reuters News Service. Could you talk a little bit about the status of the work on the agricultural part of the text and particularly the question of eliminating export subsidies? Is that something that the U.S. is going to insist be a part of the final declaration? Because the EU is saying that they can't have that, because it would imply a sweeping change in their agricultural policy.

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: (Laughing.) Well, it would require a sweeping change in their agricultural policy! That's for sure. That's the point.

Q (Laughs.)

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Well, the agricultural sector is very interesting. That's a difficult one, because you do have strong feelings on either side. But I think that the general feeling in Geneva is -- and in capitals -- is that Stuart Harbinson has provided a very good basis for negotiating a final declaration on agriculture. And what the exact balance will be obviously is something that ministers will have to work out. But we feel that that's a very good basis. Certainly there are areas of his text that we would like to strengthen. I can imagine there may be one or two countries that would like to weaken it. But I think we're in -- we're going in there with a very good text. I'll just leave it at that.

MODERATOR: The gentleman -- (off mike).

Q Damian Milverton with Dow Jones.

In the discussions with the ministers from AGOA countries, was the U.S. reaction to the anthrax situation raised vis-a-vis Bayer and whether or not there's a degree of double standard here in terms of it appeared the U.S. was prepared to break Bayer's patent on Cipro to meet its needs, and yet is taking a fairly hard stance towards other developing countries in terms of their health needs?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: There was some confusion on the part of African ministers as to exactly what we were and were not doing, that the U.S. government was or was not doing on that issue. And one can understand their confusion because I think that the way it was reported was rather confusing. The fact of the matter is that our Health and Human Services secretary at no point suggested that we should break anybody's patent. He is truing to buy in bulk to get a discount, but he is not threatening to break anybody's patent.

So I think it shows two things, actually, the experience with Cipro. One, it shows how very quickly the public can get concerned and generate concern about a health crisis, and it does put governments under pressure to act very quickly and effectively. The second part of the message is, though, one can act quickly and effectively within the bounds of TRIPS, which is what we've done.

MODERATOR: this will have to be the last question -- (inaudible).

Q This is Sam Gilston with Washington Tariff and Trade Letter. One personal question and one thoughtful question, or substantive question. The personal question: You said you gave unclassified briefings to members of the business community who were going who didn't have classified -- have security clearances. When are you going to give unclassified briefings to the press, American press that are going to a meeting in Doha?

And the high-falutin question is, what will the Western and developed nations have to do to convince the developing countries to go along with the round, because there still seems to be strong resistance from countries like India to even launching the round? So what are you going to have to do to get them on board?

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: We're going to ask them the question, "Are you better off with the round or without it?" and then let them answer it. No, I think that actually -- and I think more and more of them are answering that question, not out loud with an affirmative, but in terms of the way they're negotiating and so forth. As I said earlier, I don't think people are under any illusions as to what the objective is in Doha, and that is to launch a negotiating -- global negotiations.

And on the question about briefing the press on security, I mean that is something that we would have to look into, now that you've asked it. I don't know what your experience is when you deal with State Department and Defense Department, for example, whether they provide those sorts of security briefings or not. That would be something that we would want to check into.

Q (Off mike.)

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: Yeah, no. And as I said earlier, I mean, we understand that this -- you know, these are difficult decisions, maybe not so much for the individuals, but there's anxiety on the part of families and so forth. And we're aware of that. So let us look into that, take it under advisement and, as I said, look to see how State Department and Defense Department handle that.

Q (Off mike.)

SR. U.S. TRADE OFFICIAL: I don't have any gas masks. (Laughs.)

Okay, thank you very much.

END.

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