From Rudo M. Chitiga

Secretary-General IRED

This was the first of what is to become regular briefings by WTO. The briefings will be organised after specific meetings. This briefing focused on the meeting of the General Council which was mandated by the Ministerial meeting to develop a future work programme and to discuss how the new round of negotiations will take place.

The General Council is said to have agreed that the multilateral trade system

was not the case of the current financial crisis.

Most countries called for a full and comprehensive round rather than a sectorial approach. However, African countries were against a new round. They favoured that attention be given to implementation. India reminded developed countries to meet their commitments on the Convention of biodiversity first before using environment as a trade barrier. Most countries also supported the need to pay special attention to LDC issues.

Regarding civil society, only the EU and Mexico spoke in favour of public involvement in WTO discussions. The EU stressed that not involving CSOs would be dangerous. On the other hand, India stated that stakeholder participation in WTO would be premature.

The next issue was the Dispute settlement Board meeting. A list of dispute that had come before the board was outlined. Developing countries, particularly in Latin America, had applied for a legal aid office to assist them in preparing and defending their cases. This is not yet in place.

Mr Pederson indicated that the Director General was very keep to get feedback from civil society, in particular related to transparency of the WTO process.

He hoped that in future, the WTO website would contain position papers presented by different countries at meetings. Presently NGOs have no access to these position papers or Committee meeting documents. They have to rely on the briefing. NGOs were free to use the briefing in any way they wanted. The WTO officials are however not allowed to give the briefing in writing.

Conclusion

This was the first briefing and a positive step in the right direction. The officials admitted that they are also learning. The nature of the briefing is such that one can not follow specific issues unless they were a subject of the meeting.

Because you are given the positions of the different countries, it makes it easy to follow up and do lobbying.

Rudo M. Chitiga

Secretary-General IRED

Development Innovations & Networks (IRED)

P.O. Box 116, 1211 Geneva 20

Tel (022) 734 17 16 - Fax (022) 740 00 11

E-mail : ired@worldcom.ch