The World Trade Organisation is trying to pick up the pieces after the failed meeting in the Mexican resort. The EU has launched what it calls a period of reflection before deciding what its trade priorities will be.

"First we have to get over the period of shock and mourning which is evident in capitals, Brussels in particular," said Uri Dadush, head of the World Bank's international trade department.

"We needed small confidence-building steps, for example, a statement from the key negotiators that they are eager to get back into the process, he added to Reuters.

The EU in particular has been a key force behind the global trade talks, insisting on the need for broad trade rules and agreements rather than a patchwork of bilateral deals.

The United States has broadly backed the WTO talks, but also pursued bilateral agreements.

The EU has also suggested that the Cancun failure meant the WTO needed to overhaul its decision-making procedures, which EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy has lambasted as medieval.

Dadush said such discussions should not prevent the negotiations from restarting as soon as possible, hopefully before a meeting of senior trade officials which the Cancun meeting agreed should take place on December 15 in Geneva.

He also said that world leaders needed to express more support for the talks.

The round of negotiations was supposed to finish at the end of 2004, but the Cancun collapse meant this deadline has become very difficult to achieve.

Dadush said getting agreement on bringing down barriers to trade in agricultural products was the key factor to make the trade talks a success. But this was a big problem ahead of Cancun, with rich nations unwilling to cut subsidies to farmers.

"Agriculture is the single most important element of moving these negotiations forward," Dadush said.