Inside Out | WTO still dithers while climate change, pandemic and trade war threaten the globe
- Despite the pressing challenges facing the world, the WTO has produced precious little change
- Before the postponement of the latest meeting, negotiators were making tentative noises about a possible agreement on fisheries subsidies and an e-commerce deal – the same areas as four years ago
But there is a minor time-warp problem. This was the WTO news report’s headline for the ministerial meeting, but it was on December 13, 2017 – at the end of the 11th WTO ministerial in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Soon afterwards, a study led by a team from King’s College London provided its summary: the meeting was “immediately celebrated and derided in equal measure”, it said.
From their point of view, “the meeting’s outcome was indeed significant. It consolidated the process of reconfiguring the WTO’s negotiating function; and enabled members to tackle more effectively a range of pressing economic and social issues as well as to navigate blockers and blockages in the negotiations”.
11:11
CPTPP could become game changer and supplant 'out-of-date' WTO, after mainland China, Taiwan apply
Perhaps only in the corridors of the WTO headquarters on the shores of Lake Geneva could “reconfiguring a negotiating function” and “navigating blockers” be regarded as significant outcomes.