World Trade Organisation (WTO) chief Pascal Lamy presented his blueprint on Saturday for a crucial trade summit next month, saying he hoped it would speed the search for a global free trade deal, Reuters reported. The meeting of WTO ministers in Hong Kong no longer aims to agree a draft treaty on reforming world trade but it still needs to clear the way for such a pact to be struck in early 2006. "I hope that this will convince them that it is worth taking further steps," Lamy told journalists after presenting his 8-page draft ministerial declaration to WTO envoys. As expected, the text set out few goals for the ministerial meeting other than calling for new dates by which a draft treaty, spelling out all the major moves to open up markets in farm and industrial goods and services, would be agreed. Lamy added that he hoped that WTO states would be able to make the draft more specific, notably in the areas of farm and industrial goods, before it is sent for final approval by the WTO's executive General Council next Dec. 1-2. "I think that we all agree that we need to work hard to improve the text...before Hong Kong," he said in his address to envoys.
