The delegates called upon the developed countries to remove trade barriers and fulfil their repeated pledges concerning a wide range of other trade facilitation measures.

Tanaznian Minister for Industry and Trade Juma A Ngasongwa, who chaired the LDCs' first ministerial conference in Zanzibar, handed over chairmanship of the second one to Bangladesh Commerce Minister Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury.

The Dhaka meeting aims to set a common agenda of the LDCs for the WTO ministerial conference at Cancun in Mexico in September this year.

The Zanzibar meeting tried to work out a common LDC stand for the fourth ministerial conference of the WTO held in Doha.

Speakers at the meeting yesterday noted the LDCs are under constant pressure not to give subsidy while the developed countries continue to subsidise their own agriculture sector by about $1billion a day.

Expectations of the LDCs have not been fulfilled but the LDCs are asked to fulfil their obligations, they pointed out.

Inaugurating the conference, Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury said the World Bank estimates that in Japan the subsidy for a cow is $7.5 a day and that in the European Union is more than $2.

" To put this in context, about a billion people survive on less than a dollar a day. Are the WTO rules to protect cows in developed countries, in preference to the underprivileged in our countries?" he asked.

Amir Khosru said in some cases the applicable rules of origin act as barriers to the entry of the LDCs' goods to the developed countries. In other cases, it could be that other non-tariff barriers make the concessions inoperable, he added.

"Are the LDCs benefiting from the rule-based multilateral trading system? And, what has been the impact of the system on the share of LDCs in world trade? Are we better off than before?" he asked. Over the last few decades, the LDCs' share of world trade has declined drastically, despite an increase in the number of the LDCs, he mentioned.

"We need to send a strong message to the international community emphasising our interests," Khosru said.

Juma A Ngasongwa said because of very low levels of the LDCs' economic development, the chances of further marginalisation within the global economy are too real to be ignored unless further measures are taken in their favour.

He said there are major concerns of the LDCs that need to be addressed by the multilateral trading system. Citing examples of the supply side constraints in respect of infrastructure, human resource and capacity of the LDCs' economies, he stressed the need for predictable and easy market access of the LDCs' exports.

Besides, implementation issues in the context of the WTO agreements and accession barriers to the LDCs, who are yet to become members of the WTO, are also concerns of the LDCs, Juma added.

He noted that some important deadlines in the Doha development agenda have not been met, affecting the LDCs. These include implementation problems, special and differential treatment, agriculture and public health. "At the same time, we are under extreme pressure to start negotiations and assume new obligations on Singapore Issues," he said.

The WTO agenda has to take into account the concerns of the LDCs, Juma said. "This, I believe, is the only way to have a sustainable multilateral trading system."

Commerce Secretary Suhel Ahmed said most of the LDCs have comparative advantages in temporary migration of workforce. So, it is essential that the developed countries extend commercially meaningful liberalisation commitments on such temporary migration, he felt.

He stressed the LDCs should be given the opportunity to increase their share of world trade to three per cent by 2007 and seven per cent by 2010 through duty and quota free market access, realistic and flexible rules of origin, substantially expanded special and differential treatment and separate GSP scheme.

Director of Development Division of the WTO Alberto Campeas hoped issues like market access and special and differential treatment will be addressed at the Cancun conference.

Head of Special Programme for the LDCs, UNCTAD, Habib Ovane stressed more integration of the LDCs in the multilateral trading system. UNCTAD would help the LDCs more to formulate their trade policies, he added.

Bangladesh Representative to Geneva and Chairman of the WTO LDCs Consultative Group Coordinator Toufiq Ali also spoke at the opening session.