WTO talks extended in bid to seal elusive deals

The World Trade Organisation’s ministerial conference will run over into a fifth day on Thursday in the hope of striking thus-far elusive deals on fishing subsidies, food security, and combating Covid-19.

The gathering of trade ministers at the WTO’s headquarters in Geneva was due to wrap up on Wednesday, with the global trade body hoping to conclude landmark deals to prove it still has a role to play in tackling big global challenges.

But WTO chief Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who has staked her leadership on breathing new life into the sclerotic organisation, said it seemed the remaining sticking points could be resolved if ministers ploughed on.

“Progress is being made, but it needs a little more work and more time,” the director-general said.

The gathering is the first WTO ministerial conference in nearly five years. The global trade body only takes decisions by consensus among its 164 members.

“It requires that we work harder and work nights, whatever it takes,” Okonjo-Iweala said.

“It is really time for ministers to make the requisite decisions that need to be made.”

She said countries “feel that we really can cross the line on some of these things if we gave it a bit more time”.

The former finance and foreign minister of Nigeria, who took office in March 2021, is keen to make the WTO a relevant player on the international stage.

The last WTO ministerial conference, in December 2017 in Buenos Aires, was widely considered a flop, closing without a major agreement.

Country-specific trade benefit extensions

The WTO member countries have agreed to provide some support to the LDC graduating countries based on need, country-specific and based on assessment of the level of development of the graduating LDCs.

On the third day of the negotiations of the 12th ministerial conference of the WTO, the member countries could only reach a consensus that the graduating LDCs would be given some support, but those are not specified in the negotiation documents yet, which means that they are dependent on tough negotiation in the future.

“It is better that all the countries have agreed to provide some support to the LDC graduating countries, although we demanded general market access for a few years after graduation,” said Hafizur Rahman, director-general of the WTO Cell under the Commerce Ministry of Bangladesh.

Hafizur, however, said that the possibility of trade extension for the graduating LDCs is very thin.

He informed that currently some 26 countries are waiting to be graduated from the LDCs to developing countries as they are in the transition period now while 10 more countries are waiting to be graduated in the next few decades.

“We will continue our negotiations along with other LDCs so that we can get the general market access even after the graduation for few more years, but not the supports based on need and country specific,” said Hafizur.

Some negotiators at the meeting venue said that primarily the US argued on the proposal of providing LDC trade extension benefit to the graduating countries and later few other developed countries also joined the USA in the meeting.

During the negotiation, all the LDCs, all the developing, many developed countries and the European Union supported the proposal of graduating LDCs for the general market access for a few more years, but finally, it did not happen because of opposition from a few developed countries, Hafizur said.

A few developed countries argued that all the LDC graduating countries have not developed at the same pace, at the same standards, and that all the graduating countries’ needs are not the same.

He said that they agreed that the trade extension benefit would be given to the LDC graduating countries based on their needs, country-specific and after the assessment of their level of development.