Civil-Government Joint Organization to Prepare for New Round

The government will establish a civil-government joint organization to prepare for the launch of New Round next year.

The government will discuss for the establishment of a new negotiation organization at a meeting of the ministers related to foreign affairs and economy because it is very difficult to cope effectively with the large-scale negotiation with the current system. The new organization will include the experts not only from the government but also from the business side and NGOs.

Choi Hyuk, trade negotiation coordinator of the Foreign Affairs and Trade Ministry, said, ``the new negotiation system has to be established by the end of this year since the trade negotiation committee of WTO will be held in January next year. We should intensively prepare for New Round because the entire period of the negotiation is only 3 years.``

The MAFT anticipated that the agreements for next three years, which were stipulated by the Cabinet Announcement, will be implemented from 2006 after the sanction of the National Assembly. The New Round was named as `Doha Round` at the 9th multi-lateral trade negotiation. The developing countries call it `Doha Developing Round` to emphasize the interests of the developing countries.

Meanwhile, Prof. Michael Young (George Washington University) anticipated in a seminar of `the U.S.`s Trade Policy` hosted by the Federation of Korean Industries that the U.S.`s import restraints will be strengthened even after the launch of New Round.

He also added, ``the future of free trade after the launch of New Round is uncertain and New Round will achieve very limited success, betraying the expectation of the WTO member nations.``

Prof. Young indicated that ``it is because the U.S. has no will to lead the international free trade by opening its own market, the E.U. is reluctant to open its service and agricultural market, and Japan does not try to exert its leadership in world market.`` Particularly, the traditional support groups for the free trade such as financial industry and manufacturing industries that had overseas factories are now becoming pessimistic about the benefit of the free trade.

He anticipated, ``the regional trade negotiations will continue to proliferate and the pressure for market opening by bi-lateral negotiations will increase. The U.S. will strengthen its pressure to the nations that do not take reciprocal measures by the bi-lateral negotiation.``

Yeon-Su Sin ysshin@donga.com