Tuesday, July 25 2006 10:06 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Washington: Despite the breakdown of global trade talks, a future agreement among key players is possible and the way to move forward is to 'look ahead' than being focussed on 'blame games,' the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) has said.

"The collapse of the WTO talks represents a huge setback for developing countries. The agricultural trade policies of the industrialised countries harm the economies of many developing nations, where millions of poor people are dependent on agriculture for food and income," the research organisation said in a statement here.

"But too much is at stake, especially for the world's small-scale farmers, to play the 'blame game' and point fingers. Instead, we need to look forward and identify the opportunities that lay ahead," Antonie Bouet, Senior Research Fellow of IFPRI said.

"Reaching an agreement that helps farmers of developing countries may not be as difficult as it appears. While the most recent US and EU proposals fell short of the deep cuts necessary to make a difference for poor people, two opportunities are currently lying on the table," Bouet said.

According to the researcher, IFPRI has studied various proposals, modelled the effect of a compromise agreement, and found that global income gains amount to USD 55 billion. As this this scenario did little for developing countries, two additional changes were modelled.

"First, if free access of least-developed countries to wealthy-country markets is increased from 97 per cent of imports to 100 per cent, as proposed by the EU, world income would increase by an additional US$ 14 billion over the compromise scenario," he said.