organizations; International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank (WB) and International Trade Organization (ITO). The first two came into being soon but the third one was left out because US felt that it would weaken its own dominant position in the global trade. Instead of that, various Western European nations signed different agreements with each other. They culminated into one forum called General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) which was established in Geneva on 30 October 1947. Its original aim was to reduce the restrictions on mutual trade and it worked to some extent with regard to industrial products. However, the trade of farm produce remained out of its purview. A major development took place in 1986 during the GATT Conference in Uruguay in Latin America, in which 123 nations participated. There were heated discussions on different points and negotiations were not going anywhere. When the Conference was about to be concluded without any agreement, Arthur Dunkel, the Director General of GATT since 1980, took initiative and offered to produce a document for future negotiations. Dunkel was a Swiss administrator highly respected for his competence. He remained in his chair for thirteen years, till 1993. After working hard for five years he produced in 1991 a draft of the proposed agreement which was called “Dunkel Draft”. It was a historic turning point in the on-going negotiations between nations. Mr Dunkel’s deep understanding of the technical issues combined with his shrewd diplomacy transformed hundreds of thousands of pages of diverse, often conflicting, proposals into a manageable single document of some 500 pages, distilling the essence of numerous agreements signed earlier under GATT. It was quite a remarkable feat and he was highly acclaimed for that. He circulated the Draft in 1991 amongst all nations for discussion and comments and pursued consistently. After many Search for New Ways
Q
287
