Application for WTO membership gets US backing

The United States government has pledged to throw its weight behind Ethiopia's efforts to join the World Trade Organisation (WTO), the embassy in the capital, Addis Ababa, said on Monday.

In a statement, the embassy quoted US Trade Representative for Africa Florizelle Liser as telling the Ethiopian government that the US was committed to trading with Africa and assisting African countries achieve their goal of sustainable development.

"We believe Ethiopia can be an important leader within WTO, as it has been in other regional and international organisations. Within the WTO, Ethiopia can share in its benefits and responsibilities, and participate in its decision-making," said Liser at the end of a two-day visit to Ethiopia, one of the world's poorest countries, where the annual per capita income is around US $100.

The WTO is a global organisation dealing with the rules of trade between nations. It aims to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct business fairly. Ethiopia applied to join the WTO in January 2003. For its application to succeed, the government will have to comply with strict foreign trade regulations and persevere in implementing economic reforms.

Liser noted that Ethiopia’s exports to the US under Washington's trade initiative – the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) - had increased by 38 percent.

But despite calls for trade improvements, Ethiopia maintains that it has seen little benefit from trade deals like AGOA. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has said that the country has so far secured only $1.8 million by exporting goods to the US under the AGOA terms.

AGOA was introduced just over four years ago to open up a tariff-free trade arrangement between the US and an initial 36 African countries. Membership of AGOA depends on US-defined rules on good governance and democracy, failing to observe which could cause the member state to lose all its trade benefits under the Act.

During her visit, Liser also met senior officials of the African Union (AU) to discuss the role that trade could play in alleviating poverty on the continent. The AU has argued in the past that despite the rhetoric about the WTO and other trade arrangements, developing countries were still at the mercy of rich nations like the US.

Vijay Makhan, the AU former commissioner for trade, industry and economic affairs, claimed after the collapse of global trade talks in Cancun, Mexico, last year, that rich nations had failed to live up to their promises.