7 March Quint Group meeting

Date: 12/03/1998

THE world's five largest agricultural trading blocks (US, EU, Canada, Australia and Japan) held informal talks in Paris, with Agriculture Commissioner Franz Fischler in the chair. The delegates each gave a brief presentation highlighting recent trade developments in their respective agriculture sectors, and devoted the rest of the time to a discussion of next year's World Trade Organisation talks on farm trade liberalisation. The meeting was declared by all sides to have been an unequivocal success as an exercise in broadening mutual understanding prior to the WTO negotiations. “The idea is to know more about each other and to create a good atmosphere,” said Fischler after the meeting.

US AGRICULTURE Secretary Dan Glickman echoed this positive view, saying: “We had a very constructive dialogue. This has contributed positively to next year's WTO talks because we now have a fuller understanding of each other's political complexities.” However, he also sounded a note of caution, adding: “This doesn't necessarily mean that I am any closer in opinion to any of their positions.”

THE Quint Group, which has not met since 1990, is now expected to meet again in Canada in the summer of 1999, by which time the WTO talks will be under way. Agreement between the EU and the US, the world's largest exporters of agricultural products, is thought to be essential if the next WTO round is to reach a successful conclusion. But the EU, together with Japan, is regularly criticised by its Quint partners for protecting its agricultural markets. Japan owes its place at the Quint table to its status as the world's largest importer of farm products.

THE five trading partners also addressed the issue of Indonesia's economic collapse, following Jakarta's announcement last week that it would start subsidising imports of food and other essentials. “We had a very valuable discussion about the need to ensure troubled Asian economies are assisted as quickly as possible, and that includes Indonesia,” said Australian Primary Industries Minister John Anderson afterwards. Australia is a major exporter of farm goods to the whole South East Asian region.