WTO agriculture text is unfair

GENEVA: Developing countries on Friday dismissed current proposals to free up farm trade as inadequate and unfair but said an overall deal to tear down global trade barriers was still possible.

A multilateral agreement in the six-year-old Doha round of trade talks remains "within our grasp" despite an impasse on agriculture and internal splits over industrial goods, the Group of 20 developing countries said.

Six ministers from the G20, including those from India, South Africa, Argentina and Indonesia, met at the World Trade Organisation at the behest of Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim, who is the country's chief trade negotiator.