Context

The World Trade Organization (WTO)’s 12th Ministerial Conference (MC12) is being convened in Geneva, Switzerland at the end of this month.

Ministerial Conferences

• The topmost decision-making body of the WTO is the Ministerial Conference, which usually meets every two years. It brings together all members of the WTO, all of which are countries or customs unions.
• The Ministerial Conference can take decisions on all matters under any of the multilateral trade agreements

The task ahead for MC12

• Recent WTO estimates show that global trade volumes could expand by almost 11% in 2021, and by nearly 5% in 2022, and could stabilise at a level higher than the pre-COVID-19 trend.
• The MC12 needs to consider how in these good times for trade, the economically weaker countries “can secure a share in the growth in international trade commensurate with the needs of their economic development’, an objective that is mandated by the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization.
• Some of the areas are currently witnessing intense negotiations, these include adoption of WTO rules on electronic commerce, investment facilitation, and fisheries subsidies.

Following issues will form the basis of MC12 discussions

1) IPR waiver for Covid-19 related technologies

• Pharmaceutical companies have used monopoly rights granted by their IPRs to deny developing countries access to technologies and know-how, thus undermining the possibility of production of vaccines in these countries.
• To remedy this situation, India and South Africa had tabled a proposal in the WTO in October 2020, for waiving enforcement of several forms of IPRs on “health products and technologies including diagnostics, therapeutics, vaccines, medical devices.
•  This proposal, supported by nearly two-thirds of the organisation’s membership, was opposed by the developed countries batting for their corporates.
• The unfortunate reality of the current discussions is that an outcome supporting affordable access to COVID-19 vaccines and medicines looks distant.

2) Fisheries subsidies

• Discussions on fisheries subsidies have been hanging fire for a long time, there is considerable push for an early conclusion of an agreement to rein in these subsidies.
• The current drafts on this issue do not provide the wherewithal to rein in large-scale commercial fishing.
• Large scale commercial fishing is depleting fish stocks the world over, and at the same time, are threatening the livelihoods of small fishermen in countries such as India.

3) E-commerce

• Discussions on e-commerce are being held in the WTO since 1998, wherein WTO members agreed to “continue their practice of not imposing customs duties on electronic transmissions”.
• The more substantive outcome was the decision to “establish a comprehensive work programme” taking into “account the economic, financial, and development needs of developing countries”.
• However, in 2021, a key focus of the 1998 e-commerce work programme, namely “development needs of developing countries”, is entirely missing from the text document that is the basis for the current negotiations.
• On the negotiating table are issues relating to the liberalisation of the goods and services trade, and of course guarantee for free flow of data across international boundaries, all aimed at facilitating expansion of businesses of e-commerce firms.
• In fact, the decision on a moratorium on the imposition of import duties agreed to in 1998 has become the basis for a push towards comprehensive trade liberalisation — a perfectly logical way forward, given that the sole objective of the negotiations on e-commerce is to facilitate expansion of e-commerce firms.

4) Investment facilitation

• Inclusion of substantive provisions on investment in the WTO has been one of the more divisive issues.
• In 2001, the Doha Ministerial Declaration had included a work programme on investment, but developing countries were opposed to its continuation because the discussions were geared to expanding the rights of foreign investors through a multilateral agreement on investment.
• An investment facilitation has reintroduced the old agenda of concluding such an investment agreement.

Issues with the negotiations

• The negotiations on e-commerce and investment facilitation are being conducted not by a mandate given by the entire membership of the WTO in a transparent manner.
• Instead, these negotiations owe their origins to the so-called “Joint Statement Initiatives” (JSI) in which a section of the membership has developed the agenda with a view to producing agreements in the WTO.
•  This entire process is “detrimental to the very existence of a rule-based multilateral trading system under the WTO”, as India and South Africa have forcefully argued in a submission against the JSIs early this year.

Conclusion

Current favourable tidings provide an ideal setting for the Trade Ministers from the WTO member-states to revisit trade rules and to agree on a work programme for the organisation, which can help maintain the momentum in trade growth.

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