The Fourth (World Trade Organization) Ministerial in Doha (Qatar) had an ambitious negotiating mandate in a Work Programme that was launched on 14 September 2001, to be completed by 2005. However, ever since its launch, the Doha Development Agenda, as the Work Programme has come to be called, has been facing rough weather. Missed deadlines have been the main stumbling blocks in the way of negotiations and threaten to undermine the credibility of multilateral trade dialogues. The member countries of WTO have before them an unprecedented challenge. At test is their commitment to the cause of promoting fair trade; the commitments on the part of major trading nations, especially, will have to pass this crucial test if the Doha Round of Negotiations is to succeed. The current state of negotiations, however, does not evoke much confidence about the Agenda meeting the deadline of 2005, when all the agreements must be complete and formalized as a single package. This volume is essentially an inquiry into the prospects of the much-debated Doha Round. It assembles, in one place, various points of view from different thinkers on the issues currently under negotiations, chiefly that of trade and development. Reputed experts in the field write on these and other related topics, addressing the primary concern behind the idea of this volume: can we afford to let the Doha Round of trade talks fail?.
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