WTO Mini-Ministerial Yields Commitment To Intensify Trade Facilitation Work

摘要

Trade ministers and senior officials from major World Trade Organization members meeting in Paris this week agreed to intensify technical work on a trade facilitation agreement in an effort to reach a deal on a package of trade concessions for the December WTO ministerial in Bali, Indonesia. The trade facilitation talks have slowed in Geneva as WTO members like India refused to move ahead in this area until their demands on agriculture were fully met. But at a May 30 "mini-ministerial" meeting in Paris organized by Australia, trade ministers expressed a clear commitment to resume more intensive work to clear the nearly 600 brackets in the trade facilitation text over the next month, according to U.S. and Australian trade officials.