The Doha Round of WTO trade negotiations was officially launched at the WTO's Fourth Ministerial Conference in Doha, Qatar, in November 2001. It was intended to achieve major reform of the international trading system through the introduction of lower trade barriers and revised trade rules.

The Doha Ministerial Declaration provided the mandate for negotiations on a wide range of issues. The Doha work programme covers about 20 areas of trade including agriculture, services, industrial products, intellectual property, anti-dumping and other WTO rules issues, dispute settlement, and some trade and environment issues.

The Round has also been known semi-officially as the Doha Development Agenda as a fundamental objective was to improve the trading prospects of developing countries.

At the 10th Ministerial Conference (MC10) Members could not reach consensus on continuing multilateral trade negotiations under the framework of the Doha Round. As such the Round is effectively over. Australia has argued that new approaches are necessary if we are to achieve meaningful outcomes on the outstanding Doha issues.

Australia remains supportive of ensuring the institutional credibility of the WTO is promoted and upheld. Australia will continue to work with other WTO Members to develop a new negotiating agenda for the WTO which includes important outstanding Doha issues – such as agriculture – as well as new issues relevant to the modern global trading environment.

More information on the Doha Round is available on the WTO website.