The 21 ministerial trade officials cemented their support for mobilizing an early kick-off of a new round of World Trade Organization negotiations in their ending statement issued last Thursday.

The conference is seen as a key catalyst to push forward the new rounds of talks before the Doha WTO Ministerial Conference in November, which is, as all the participants agreed, the best time for the launch of the talks.

These senior ministerial officials also said that the meeting in Shanghai will play a landmark role in bolstering the liberalization of trade and promoting technological cooperation among WTO member economies in the new century.

"The MRT's support for the new round will bolster it," said Mike Moore, director-general of the WTO, after talks with participants in Zhouzhuang, a town in nearby Jiangsu Province.

Shi Guangsheng, chair of the meeting, said that it has resulted in a significant consensus indicating all APEC members have signaled strong, firm and active support for the start of the new round of WTO talks.

"The common ground among the APEC members will influence the gathering of WTO trade ministers in November in Qatar," said Shi, also China's minister of foreign trade and economic cooperation.

APEC, founded in 1989, has already turned as the primary regional vehicle for promoting open trade and practical economical cooperation and it represents over 40 percent of the global trade.

"Having China leading APEC this year, it is a great opportunity for us to meet the goal that we are looking for in Qatar this November,"said Bruce Gosper, Australia's first assistant secretary of foreign affairs and trade.

And Thailand's commerce minister Adisai Bhotharamik also stressed that the APEC MRT meeting will send a strong signal to the rest of the world to encourage the new round of WTO talks.

The session concluded with a strong call to speed up China's 15-year marathon membership bid into the WTO and end the process before the end of the year.

Shi said that if China joins the WTO before the next round of talks in Doha begin, it can play an important role in working out the new system.

After repeated calls for flexibility and balance, China and the United States finally ironed out their differences and reached a full consensus regarding China's membership of the WTO.

This means nearly all the barriers are gone in China's 15 year-long marathon bid for membership into the largest trading organization in the world.

Mexico, which is the only WTO member that has not reached a bilateral agreement on China's entry, has promised not to hinder the country's accession even if the two sides cannot reach a final accord before China joins the WTO.

Moore also reiterated his stance to support China's early entry, saying "the WTO will not be the WTO without China as a member."

However, there is still worry that the WTO's lengthy procedures for accepting new members will delay China's access.

And analysts warn it will still be a race for China to enter the trade group before the end of the year.

US trade representative Robert Zoellick said in a statement that progress on China's entry will add momentum to the launch of a new global trade round, which could take place at a WTO meeting in Qatar in November.

China will be defined as a bridge between developing and developed countries for the next trade round. And Tu Xinquan, a senior researcher with the WTO Research Center under University of International Business and Economics, said that the accession process could be finished in a four-week period, meaning China has around four months from now to finish off all negotiations.

China's participation will greatly increase the voice of developing countries and make international trade rules fairer.

"Since China has become a strong player in international trade, its presence will largely represent the interests of developing countries, to which China belongs," Tu said.

Meanwhile, China can perhaps make other contribution to the WTO. As a country being transformed to a market economy, China's experience may be useful later on for other countries.

But if China fails to enter the organization before the launch of the new round of negotiations, it will not only weaken developing countries as a whole but also bring challenges to the country's domestic law system as changes will already have been made in preparation for WTO entry.

Although China can participate in multilateral negotiation as an observer, its opinions could hardly be adopted.

Similar worries used to prevail before the Seattle round of talks that was held last November, but they faded after the meeting failed to reach any agreement.

(China Daily June 12, 2001)