African countries including Namibia stood a much better chance to achieve better trade agreements during the present trade rounds set for Hong Kong in December 2005, a trade expert of the World Trade Organisation Geneva said. Speaking at an unfortunately poorly attended forum organised by the Namibia Agricultural Forum (ATF) and the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES) in Windhoek on Thursday, Dr Edwini Kessie said it was the first time African WTO member states were actively participating in the numerous discussion round followed after the November 2001 round in Doha, Qatar.

"Africa has not significantly profited from world trade, its share has decreased in fact", Kessie told trade representatives. "This is a concern for the WTO".

Kessie mentioned that the active participation of African countries was hampered due to lack of funds and capacity, but that several representatives of the continent were present in Geneva. Tom prepare for new trade rules currently discussed and to be agreed upon in due course, African countries had however to prepare for changes regarding tariff barriers, access and compliances by adopting the right policies.

Hong Kong must set the stage for the final phase of negotiations. For this to happen, ministers will have to take a number of decisions, notably establishing modalities for Agriculture and Non-Agricultural Market Access (NAMA), and provide the political guidance and impetus necessary for the discussions to move into the final phase. They include a wide range of politically sensitive and technically complex matters such as the new Special Safeguard Mechanism in favour of developing countries (SSM), tariff escalation, tariff simplification, tariff quota administration, preference erosion, and tropical products.

Another sensitive issue Dr Edwini Kessie mentioned was that operationally effective and meaningful provisions for special and differential treatment in favour of developing-country members would have to permeate all areas under negotiation and will have to be progressively developed.

Modalities for the reduction or, as appropriate, the elimination of tariffs, including the reduction or elimination of tariff peaks, high tariffs and tariff escalation, on non-agricultural products have to be established. This should be done in a way that fully takes into account the special needs and interests of developing and least-developed country participants.