Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is also on APEC and is to the Minister for Trade. Will the minister update the House on how the APEC meetings he attended have contributed to advancing global trade talks?

Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Trade) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question. We know the great interest he takes in international affairs, and trade is no exception in terms of his level of interest.

I am pleased to be able to update the House on the importance of the APEC meeting, in particular because of the leaders’ communique that emerged overnight that gave very strong impetus again to concluding the Doha Round of trade talks. This of course was the first meeting of ministers since the G20 meeting in Washington and so it was very much a response that they were required to make to give effect to that very strong resolution that came out of Washington. I remind the House also that APEC, which has 21 countries as its members, covers half of the world’s GDP and more than half the world’s trade. As far as Australia is concerned, it is responsible for two-thirds of our trading partnerships.

The G20 did recognise the importance of concluding the Doha Round as a mechanism for adding stimulation to global economic activity. This is because trade is a multiplier of economic activity. I think the significance of the G20 meeting was not just the change in composition of the countries coming together to determine the way forward but the connectedness they made to the significance of trade in stimulating economic activity.

The APEC meeting amplified and strengthened that commitment. It amplified it because, in addition to the 20 nations, an additional 12 countries signed up, at leaders’ level, to this commitment to conclude the round. Apart from the nine members that share a common membership between the G20 and APEC, it brings to 32 the numbers of countries now committed to the conclusion of this round.

It strengthened the call in Washington because for the first time it actually committed ministers to meet next month in Geneva to conclude the modalities aspect of the Doha talks. Whilst this was an important development, the actual calling of that meeting does rest with the Director-General of the WTO, Mr Pascal Lamy, and he has not yet formally determined to call the meeting. But the fact that the leaders of 32 countries are saying ‘meet’, and giving a very significant indication that we should meet next month, plus the fact that last Sunday, yesterday, there were gathered in Geneva the senior officials from all of the participating nations—and I can report to the House that important preliminary progress has been made in Geneva on those talks—sets the basis upon which the ministerial meeting can be convened next month. The Prime Minister has played a particularly active role in this. He was instrumental in the composition of the G20, the communique of the G20 and now, importantly, the strengthening of that resolve at the APEC meeting. As the Minister for Foreign Affairs has indicated, both he and I were able to use our involvement at this APEC meeting to strengthen—and not just in a bilateral sense—importantly, a grouping of ministers recommending to the leaders.

Finally, I report to the House that a meeting of Cairns Group members was also convened in Peru whilst we were there, because it is important to build bridges with the other groupings that make up the WTO. So APEC came at a crucial time, and it played an instrumental part in taking the momentum forward. It remains for us to conclude it but it was a significant fillip in that direction.