Doha talks were not rightly sold as development round: Montek Ahluwalia

The Doha round of global trade talks started in the Qatari capital on November 2001

The  Doha round of global trade talks started 11 years back have failed to adhere to the development aspect which was the main agenda for having an agreement, said Montek Singh Ahluwalia, deputy chairman of Planning Commission.

“The Doha round was not rightly sold essentially as a development round … Today, the development content of Doha is simply not there,” he said addressing a seminar – The Growth Net – organized by the Aspen Institute here today.

Montek also said that while the negotiations started with the aim of poverty alleviation in the developing countries, somehow it lacked adequate political support in the developed countries.

However, he did mention that although the Doha round led to opening up of markets through greater trade liberalization which helped developing countries greatly, the round did not achieve what it was supposed to.

The Doha round of global trade talks, which started in the Qatari capital on November 2001, has missed several deadlines to arrive at a possible conclusion mainly due to bitter differences between the developed and developing countries over market access and tariff reduction on industrial goods and subsidies on agriculture.

The Doha round is the longest of all multilateral trade negotiations. Prior to this, the Uruguay round went on for eight years under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade.