Trade Minister Andrew Robb must use this week'sWorld Trade Organisation (WTO) ministerial meeting in Nairobi to revitalise the Doha round of trade talks.
Getting the Doha talks back on track should be a trade policy priority for the Australian Government.
Multilateral trade liberalisation is too important for Australian businesses, jobs and the economy to fall victim to the Liberal Partys Free Trade Agreement (FTA) fixation.
Mr Robb has spent tens of millions of taxpayer dollars promoting FTAs but has had almost nothing to say about multilateral trade reform and the future of the Doha round.
Australia has played a pivotal role in multilateral trade talks, from the creation of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade in 1948 to the successful conclusion of the WTOs Uruguay round in 1994.
Yet Mr Robb and Prime Ministers Abbott and Turnbull have scaled back Australias commitment to the WTO and adopted a defeatist attitude to multilateral trade liberalisation.
The finalisation of a Trade Facilitation Agreement at the WTOs 2013 Bali Ministerial meeting shows results can be achieved by focussing on specific issues on the Doha work program an approach spearheaded by Labor Trade Minister Craig Emerson.
With the Nairobi meeting starting tomorrow, Mr Robb must spell out the Governments ambitions for multilateral trade reform and its strategy for revitalising the Doha round.
The Abbott/Turnbull Government will bear a share of responsibility if this meeting does not achieve acceptable progress or, worse still, fails to commit to the future of the Doha round.