The first ever summit between the Heads of State and Government of the three IBSA Dialogue Forum countries, India, Brazil and South Africa, which took place in the Brazilian capital Brasilia yesterday (September 13) saw the three leaders - South African President Thabo Mbeki, Brazilian President and host Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, and Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh - all stress the importance of developing economic links between their countries and cooperation in the current (Doha) round of World Trade Organisation talks.

"This summit marks the consolidation of this initiative - the suggestion which led to the creation of IBSA was made by President Mbeki at my inauguration (in 2002)," said President Lula during the open Plenary Session of the Summit.

"We are emerging economies destined to have a more and more relevant international presence," he affirmed.

"The successes we are seeking cannot be achieved if we do not form alliances in the business sector; the role of business will indeed be very critical," asserted President Mbeki.

"The business community needs to work to unlock the economic value of our trilateral cooperation," he urged.

"IBSA creates the opportunity for supply chains across the South that could be attrcative to business," he highlighted, pointing to sectors such as agribusiness, automotive, information and communications technology, and aerospace.

"While IBSA is still in its early stages - this is the first summit - the opportunities are clearly enormous," he emphasised.

IBSA, Prime Minister Singh stressed, "will also develop the kind of institutional and business linkages in important sectors such as energy, sustainable development, trade, transportation, and science and technology, that will impart new momentum and and substance to our trilateral cooperation."

"We need," Dr Singh pinpointed, " to address the critical question of connectivity; the growth of trade, and of people-to-people contact, can reach its full potential only if the movement of goods and people is further facilitated."

There already is a trilateral MoU on air servces, and an agreement on maritime transport has also been concluded, but these have to be operationalised.

Concerning the WTO talks, Dr Singh stated "the utility that IBSA brings to the world community is evident in the leadership that our three countries have provided to the G-20 in WTO trade negotiations." (The G-20 is the group of mainly middle-ranking developing countries formed to defend and promote their trade interests in the WTO talks.) "While success still eludes us in the Doha Round, we can derive considerable satisfaction from the role we have played in facilitating coalition building on difficult trade matters," said the Prime Minister.

"We were together at the origins of the G-20," recalled President Lula.

"The Doha Round is a test we must now pass; we hope the developed countries will now take on their responsibilities," he asserted.

"We can no longer accept that developed countries agricultural policies be exempted (from normal trade rules)," he warned, stating that agricultural subsidies must end.

He added that, should the agricultural issues at the WTO be satisfactorily resolved, the developing countries would then be in a position to make offers to developed countries in other sectors.

President Mbeki also referred to the difficulties of the Doha Round and explicity agreed with the comments made by his two colleagues.

"Developing countries should form strong partnerships and alliances," he argued, pointing out that this would unlock the opportunities that could be developed between them