During the past 10 days, the Chinese delegation and the WTO members made great efforts trying to reach a package agreement to conclude the negotiations on China's WTO accession, said trade sources. Having failed to meet the target, all parties concerned still agreed that the negotiations had made tremendous progress.

In his assessment statement at Wednesday's formal meeting, Acting Chairman of the Working Party on China and WTO Deputy Director-General Paul Ravier said that the current session accelerated the process of China's accession and achieved more encouraging results. He hoped that the results would trigger the ultimate conclusion of the negotiations.

"Overall, I feel that none of the outstanding problems are insurmountable," he said. "In each case the political decisions are now very clear and unambiguous. I consider that this session has been a successful one in sharply defining the political decisions needed."

A number of WTO members spoke highly of China's important measures taken by the Chinese delegation to speed up the process. A delegate from the European Union said, "The package agreement is very very close."

In their statements, many members from the developing world expressed their opposition to the unreasonable demands which certain members from the developed countries had intended to make to China. They said that they supported China's stand and called for an early conclusion of the talks in order for China to join the WTO as soon as possible.

China's chief trade negotiator Long Yongtu said, "It's regretful that we could not reach a package agreement due to one or two major issues. But the Chinese delegation firmly believes that the positions we insist on are correct and are supported by the majority of the WTO members."

He told the session that China has a total agricultural population of 900 million. Therefore, he said, to ensure the stability of agriculture is of utmost importance to China's social stability and economic development. It is an undisputed fact that China's agriculture is featured by inferior natural endowments, inefficiency of labor force and backward technology.

"China is willing to promote restructuring in this sector and to participate in international competition through opening the market of agricultural products," Long said. "However, the Chinese government needs to maintain WTO-consistent agricultural support measures after its accession to the WTO. The interests of the 900 million farmers will always be our top priority."

He expressed hope that all WTO members will be "fully prepared" to finally realize the common objective of China's accession to the WTO when they meet in Geneva in late February and/or early March.

"China is looking forward to its early accession to the WTO. By that time, China will be able to start the implementation of our commitments made in the WTO negotiations and enable the WTO members to benefit the significant commitment of China's market opening," he added.

(Xinhua 01/18/2001)