US will make "real" farm cuts in WTO deal - Portman

WASHINGTON, May 25 (Reuters) The United States is prepared to make deep cuts in domestic farm spending as part of new a world trade deal, U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman said today.

Portman rejected suggestions a U.S. farm trade proposal made in October actually would allow the United States to spend more than the roughly 20 billion dollars per year its now spends to support its farmers.

''It's real and it cuts quite deeply in terms of the current support that is provided,'' Portman told reporters after signing a trade and investment cooperation pact with Swiss Economics Minister Joseph Deiss.

World Trade Organization members are struggling to agree by mid-June on basic formulas for cutting farm subsidies and reducing agricultural and manufacturing tariffs after more than four years of talks.

Shortly after Portman spoke, French President Jacques Chirac said the EU had offered all it could on farm trade and the United States now held the key to a deal.

Portman has repeatedly pressed the European Union for deeper farm tariff cuts, saying what Brussels has offered so far would not generate ''real'' increases in trade.

At the same time, the United States has been under pressure from the EU and other trading partners to offer deeper domestic subsidy cuts than in it proposed in October.

Brazil, in particular, has raised concern the U.S. proposal would allow Washington to continue farm subsidy spending at approximately the same level by shifting money from one WTO-designated farm program category to another.

Portman has said for months that the United States is willing to go further in cutting farm subsidies if the EU and other countries offer meaningful farm tariff cuts.

He defended the United States' October proposal, but said the need for Washington to make real farm subsidy cuts was as true as the need for others to really open their markets to more imported farm goods.

Deiss told reporters he hoped the United States would offer new commitments to cut domestic farm subsidies in the coming weeks to help move the talks to a successful conclusion.

However, WTO Director General Pascal Lamy might have to act as an ''honest broker'' to bring all the parties together for a final deal, he said.

Reuters SI DB2338