European Union external trade commissioner Peter Mandelson has welcomed the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation's decision to make bigger cuts in farm subsidies to revive the comatose global trade talks at the World Trade Organisation.

In an informal chat with newspersons on the sidelines of the HT Leadership Summit, Mandelson said: "If all the negotiating partners live up to that statement, then we have greater hope of negotiations (at the WTO)".

Meeting at Hanoi on Saturday, the APEC leaders had stated the major players in the group were willing to accept deeper cuts in trade-distorting farm subsidies.

The APEC statement implies that the bigger members would make "real cuts" in industrial tariffs and establish new openings in the services trade.

APEC accounts for nearly half of the global trade and nearly 60 per cent of the world's GDP. It includes economies and political systems as varied as global superpower United States and the tiny sultanate of Brunei.

Mandelson, meanwhile, was noncommittal on taking India to the Disputes Settlement Body (DSB) at the WTO on duties levied on wine imports from the European Union. He said a decision "will be taken soon".

But Mandelson said the duties levied on EU wines and spirits were "not compatible with WTO norms". They needed "to change", he added.

A Commerce and Industry Ministry official said, "the EU Trade officials had raised this issue at a meeting Mandelson had with Minister Kamal Nath on Friday".

A EU executive Commission report this year, prompted by complaints from European producers had said that some Indian states imposed duties and taxes as high as 550 per cent on imported spirits and 264 per cent on imported wines.