ISLAMABAD, Oct 1: Director General World Trade Organization (WTO), Dr. Supachai Panitchpakdi said on Wednesday Pakistan is an influential member of the WTO and it has a very important role to play in the coming days under the multilateral trading system.

The DG said this in a meeting with President General Pervez Musharraf. He was accompanied by Commerce Minister, Humayun Akhtar Khan, Secretary Commerce, Kamal Afsar and Pakistan’s ambassador to WTO, Dr. Manzoor Ahmad.

Dr Supachai agreed with the views of President Musharraf that due to high subsidies provided on agricultural produces in the developed countries, the developing countries were unable to export their products to their markets.

He informed the president that after the Cancun ministerial conference in Mexico, he needed to initiate fresh consultations with trade ministers of the member countries and Pakistan was the first country that he was visiting in this regard.

During the meeting, the DG briefed the president regarding the current status of Doha Development agenda trade negotiations in the WTO with specific reference to the recently concluded Cancun conference.

Dr. Supachai praised the Pakistan government for the sustainable efforts it had made over the past few years to improve the economic conditions of the country, and said that the beneficial results of these efforts already becoming visible to all.

President Musharraf told the DG that in future also Pakistan would continue to be supportive of his efforts to steer the negotiations forward in a way that developing countries could achieve their rightful share of benefits from the multilateral trading system.

The president expressed the hope that the discussions would help him in better appreciating the concerns of Pakistan.

He appreciated the efforts made so far by Dr. Supachai to faithfully fulfil the Doha mandate so that the interests of developing countries could also be served adequately.

He indicated that Pakistan was a strong supporter of the concept of a just multilateral trading system that balanced the interests of both developing as well as developed countries.

Pakistan believed in following a reasonable and constructive approach in the WTO while fully safeguarding its own commercial and economic interests, the president said.

Meanwhile, in a meeting with Commerce Minister, Humayun Akhtar Khan, the DG said he had selected Pakistan as the first country to visit in view of the fact that Pakistan had emerged as an important developing country voice in WTO.

Commerce Minister apprised the DG of Pakistan’s stance on various issues under negotiation in the current Doha round of multilateral trade negotiations.

The minister stressed upon the priority of the agriculture negotiations in view of their particular importance to Pakistan given the fact that the majority of the populations depended upon agriculture.

Pakistan was interested in seeing the drastic reduction and phasing out of trade distorting agricultural subsidies so that Pakistani farmers could realize their full economic potential.

It was equally important that its farming community was provided with adequate WTO safeguards against unfair agricultural trade practices, he said.

He said the multilateral trading system needed to be strengthened especially after the Cancun conference failure because the alternative was undesirable particularly for developing countries.

Pakistan would, therefore, be supportive of the DG in his efforts to review the negotiations process in a way that took full account of the special needs of developing countries like Pakistan.