Future of World Trade Organization -European Union as a Global Player

The 7^th of the CASE European Seminars series, a joint venture of CASE and the Leopold Kronenberg Foundation will be held on Feb. 20, 2004 at the premises of Bank Handlowy,  Traugutta 7/9 St., Leopold Kronenberg Conference Room. The seminar will start at 10:00.

The 7^th European Seminar will concentrate on the issues of global policy making process and creation of multilateral trading system. In the time of growing differences between the south and the north, in 1995 World Trade Organization was established directing its activities towards trade liberalization and lowering tariffs. According to the agreement of Doha from the year 2000, efforts of WTO have been made towards freeing of tariffs in agriculture, lowering tariffs for non-agriculture market , regulating the issue of intellectual property rights, especially for growing pharmaceutical market (TRIPS) enabling easier access to medicines and providing aid for developing countries that would allow them to improve their trade capabilities. However, negotiations of Cancun meeting depict how difficult it is to reach common stand on above issues.  Individual countries' and regional positions can be an obstacle to any compromise. There are new political coalitions built and new oppositions occur. Lack of elasticity of EU during agricultural negotiations caused by protecting CAP is one of the reasons for the conference debacle. A new phenomenon is building a coalition of developing countries. The question remains if such coalition is stable in the long run? In the face of Cancun debacle the future of negotiations is uncertain. What will be a stand of European Union? What challenges will World Trade Organization face?  

Program

10:00 - 10:10  Introduction, Dr Ewa Balcerowicz, CASE Research Foundation

10:10 - 10:30  Cancun Debacle and the Future of the Multilateral Trading System, Prof. Marian

                        Paszyński, Foreign Trade Research Institute, (IKCHZ)

10:30 - 10:50 Can we put the Doha Development Agenda back together again?, Prof. Jim Rollo,

                       Co- Director of the Sussex European Institute, Sussex University

10:50 - 11:10   Concequences of EU stand on agriculture for Future WTO Negotiations, Prof. Jan

                        Jakub Michałek, Warsaw University, Faculty of Economic Sciences

11:10 - 12:30   Discussion

Seminar will be held in English.