Africa must await a global trade deal before the US will cut farm export subsidies, it is claimed.

Although President Bush, at the G8 summit earlier this month, vowed to eventually lift the farm subsidies a failure to agree a deal at the World Trade Organisation meeting in December could see the subsidies extended for years, the US has said.

Officials made the statement to member countries of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa) at a forum in Senegal.

African officials had been pushing for a timetable for the ending of farm subsidies at the meeting in Dakar.

But according to the BBC, US Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said they could not expect one until other rich countries agreed to end their own subsidies under the Doha round of WTO talks in Hong Kong in December.

"If we do not (complete Doha) a new farm bill will be set in place for a number of years and we will have lost the opportunity quite literally into the next decade," Mr Johanns said.

Agoa, signed in 2000 by Bill Clinton, gives exports of Africa's member countries duty-free status in the US market.

President Bush has extended their duty-free status through to 2015.

Since the act was signed, the value of African exports to the US has risen to $26bn, while African countries import $8bn worth of US goods.

However, agricultural subsidies favouring US farmers have dealt severe blows to African efforts to compete in the food market.

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