Analysts say it will be hard for the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) ministers meeting to turn the numerous speeches into concrete action.

They said the three day event would relapse into a “paper shuffling exercise” with plenty of rhetoric but without any practical and tangible solutions.

The meeting, which opened in Geneva, Switzerland, on November 30, has drawn over 100 trade ministers and more than 2,700 representatives from the 153 member economies of the WTO.

One day prior to the opening session, representatives from more than 100 developing countries released an urgent call for an end to the negotiations on a global free trade agreement.

The Indonesian Minister of Trade, Mari Pangestu, said that developing economies were looking for a final WTO agreement to protect their farmers from the threat of large quantities of imports.

For their part, the G-20 ministers from the leading developed and emerging economies called for immediate steps to be taken on the Doha negotiations and turn political declarations into definite commitments to reach the common goal of ending the Doha negotiations by 2010.

The request from the G-20 countries received strong support from less developed countries in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific region.

However, the WTO’s General Director Pascal Lamy said that unlike previous meetings, this one would not focus on the Doha talks but pinpoint measures to boost trade and stop protectionism.

It is an opportunity for ministers to exchange their views and put forward proposals on where the WTO should go from here, said the head of the world’s leading trade body.

The Doha development talks began in Qatar in 2001with the goal of lifting developing countries out of poverty by agreeing to cut agricultural subsidies and reducing the tariffs on industrial products.

Many international leaders have changed their commitment to the deadline for the closure of the Doha round of talks several times with the latest date set for 2010./.