In the final session of the workshop, two members of the EU-LDC Management Board summarised the foregoing workshop sessions. The first speaker summarised the outcomes of the foregoing sessions, while the second speaker focused on the lessons learnt from the conference, and on the implications for the activities and development of the EU-LDC Network.

As the world explores the ground about the opportunity/desirability of a new round of multilateral trade negotiations, two facts from the past need to be highlighted:

• Multilateral rules have been in favour, historically, of the industrialised countries. The next round needs to satisfy the needs and demands of the developing countries.
   

• Trade liberalisation provides benefits to developing countries in terms of trade expansion. However, capturing these benefits is subject to time lags as a result of supply-side constraints. Moreover, the policy outcome from trade liberalisation efforts depends much on the implementation of flanking policy measures.

Regarding a new round, the speaker made three observations:

• The alternative to a multilateral round may be the spread of regional trade agreements, many of which contain features that do not benefit developing countries and that would be rejected in the context of a New Round. Particularly significant in this regard is the use of market access as a strategic asset. This is, in itself, a very strong argument for the developing countries to push for multilateral trade rules.
   

• To the extent that developing countries do not see with clarity the need for certain types of rules and, more broadly speaking, they do not have much confidence in the results of a future trade round, effective confidence building measures are needed.
   

• A balance should be found between the objective of comprehensive negotiations and the objective of reaching an agreement over a reasonable time span.

The speaker finished by looking at the impact of a new round on poverty. He noted that this relationship is not straightforward, for three reasons:

• There is a need to distinguish between short-term and long-term effects. Social safety nets to ease the transition can be very useful in this regard. There is a role here for development co-operation to be used for helping finance these measures.
   

• The impact on developing countries will be positive only if liberalisation of both foreign and domestic markets goes hand in hand with the removal of major distortions in the economy (particularly in areas such as labour market flexibility or rules regarding anti-competitive practices).
   

• The impact of trade liberalisation on poverty will depend to a large extent on the kind of sectors that will be liberalised. Liberalisation of agriculture or textiles should have a positive effect on poverty, even though parts of the gains might be cancelled out by the erosion of preferences derived by the Least Developed Countries. If liberalisation takes place on the "new agenda" items the impact on poverty is less clear.

The second speaker presented a table, which attempts to set out some of the lessons that can be drawn from the conference and to highlight key issues for the future agenda where further information/research is required. It points, also, to how the EU-LDC Network, through its activities, may be effective in contributing to future dialogue on these areas. This table can be downloaded below.