The European Union and the United States must make substantial concessions in cutting tariffs and subsidies on agricultural products if the stalemate of the Doha round of multilateral trade negotiations is to be broken, a senior Chinese expert on the World Trade Organization (WTO) and multilateral trade told Xinhua on Thursday.

"Only after the European Union and America budge over agricultural market access can developing countries be more flexible in non-agricultural negotiations," said Li Zhongzhou, who headed the Department of International Trade and Economic Affairs of the former Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.

He said that the Doha talks had reached the "eleventh hour" as a continuous stalemate in the ongoing mini ministerial meeting convened in Geneva on Wednesday might prolong the negotiations launched in 2001 for more years.

"If the meeting failed to result in substantial progress, the chances for WTO members to wrap up the Doha round of talks by the end of 2006 would be slim," he said.

According to a timetable set by the 150 WTO members, the talks must be concluded with a wide-ranging free trade agreement by the end of the year. To meet the deadline, negotiators must reach agreements on agriculture and non-agricultural market access so enough time is left for solving other issues.

The end of June is the latest deadline set by WTO members to reach a precise formulas for cutting subsidies and tariffs. An April 30 deadline has been missed due to sharp differences between WTO members.

Calling himself "cautiously optimistic" about the meeting due to end on July 2, Li warned that any further protraction of the Doha Talks would impair the world's confidence in multilateral trade negotiations and would show WTO members that some nations are more favored than others.

To realize the goal of the Doha Development Agenda to facilitate the prosperity of developing nations, Li said that developed countries should make more compromises to meet "the ambitions" of developing countries.

The Chinese government has been actively supporting the negotiations and is hoping for a swift agreement.

Sources close to the talks said that major differences among WTO members mainly focused on agricultural market access, domestic support and non-agricultural market access as no parties involved were willing to make the concessions required.

A group of 20 developing nations has urged the European Union to cut 54 percent of its tariffs on agricultural products and the United States to slash 75 percent of its agricultural subsidies.

In response, the European Union only offered a 39 percent reduction in tariffs while the United States promised a reduction of 53 percent in subsidies.

Emerging countries like Brazil and India, dissatisfied with such offers, were reluctant to reduce their tariffs on industrial products in return.

Li Zhongzhou attributed the impasse to the "ambition" of all parties involved as the motto "no deal is better than a bad deal" is prevalent among major WTO members.

Given that the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations took nearly eight years, he noted that even if no agreements were inked this year, the Doha talks could hardly be called "a failure".

"Trade liberalization negotiations tend to take years. The key is that all parties involved communicate with one another effectively and make concerted efforts to take negotiations to a higher level," he said.

(Xinhua News Agency June 30, 2006)