HONG KONG, Dec 14: Pakistan has joined the Cairns Group representing agriculture exporting countries belonging to developed and developing nations in the ministerial meeting of the group on Wednesday, thus becoming 18th Cairns’ member

The group brings together developed and developing countries from Latin America, Africa and Pacific Asia region. It has been an influential voice in the agriculture reform debate since its formation in 1986, and has continued to play a key role in pressing the WTO members to meet in full the far-reaching mandate set in Doha.

Pakistan is an important producer, importer and exporter of agriculture products, and the sector is the main source of national employment, because over 70 per cent of its population depends on agriculture and lives in rural areas. Along with other Cairns members, Pakistan will have a vital role to play, because it has been given the role of facilitator in the non-agriculture market access (NAMA) group.

In a statement on Wednesday, Minister of Commerce, Humayun Akhtar Khan, encouraged Cairns Group ministers, “to work together and pool our resources to fight for the rights of our poor farmers and provide for a trading environment, which is not tilted in favour of the rich.”    He said his country was a constructive contributor to the Doha Round and a strong supporter of the multi-lateral rules-based system. It has been a GATT signatory since 1948, and joined the WTO on its establishment in 1995.

Other members of the group are: Argentina, Australia, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Zealand, Paraguay, Philippines, South Africa, Thailand, and Uruguay.

Meanwhile, the Cairns Group in a declaration said, it is unrealistic to expect all the divergences of this negotiation to be bridged in Hong Kong. However, we can and do aspire to take significant steps forward on the shape of a package in agriculture, in all three pillars, including on special and differential treatment, and on cotton.    The group demanded that the major subsidizers must take further meaningful steps in the area of domestic support, if we are to reach a final agriculture package. And, it should be ensured that the progress be made towards agreeing to an early end-date, no later than 2010 for the elimination of all forms of export subsidies, the most distorting of all agriculture measures.