Pressure mounted on the European Union on Thursday to agree a firm date for eliminating farm export subsidies, as World Trade Organisation ministers struggled to find ways to move the Doha trade round forward at the Hong Kong ministerial meeting that opened on Tuesday.

Rob Portman, US trade representative, said he feared the six-day meeting ? for which only modest goals had been set ? would fail to make the progress he had hoped for and might end by doing little more than setting a date for further negotiations next year.