Kuwait commerce minister underlines WTO role

12/16/2011

Kuwait commerce minister underlines WTO role

Kuwaiti Minister of Commerce and Industry Amani Bouresli

GENEVA, Kuwaiti Minister of Commerce and Industry Amani Bouresli stressed here Friday the significant role of the World Trade Organization (WTO), especially in developing and least-developed countries.

Addressing the 8th ministerial meeting of the WTO, the minister said this meeting comes at a very difficult time for all Members in light of the on-going global financial and economic crisis, described by WTO Director-General, Pascal Lamy as the worst since World War II. "However, we believe that the mission and role of the WTO has increased in importance especially for the developing and least developed countries (LDC) as a result of the financial crisis," she said.

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And despite of the global economic crisis the evidence strongly supports that some nations have reaped the benefits of their membership to WTO such as realizing higher economic growth rates, robust export growth and welfare gains, she added.

"The global crisis should be viewed as a challenge and should be dealt with positively. As described by observers; crisis carries some hidden opportunities. Therefore, upon dealing with outstanding issues we need to change our approach," Bouresli noted.

The Member states are aware of how important this conference would be in providing a platform for dialogue and assessing progress and outstanding difficulties that WTO integrated system has faced in the area of Doha Development Agenda negotiations, implementation of agreements, dispute settlement, monitoring and surveillance, capacity building, accessions, trade and development and other activities, she said.

The Kuwaiti minister went on to say: "In this regard, I call upon WTO members not to save any effort to move forward the Doha round, which can give the necessary impetus to address the present global economic challenges."

"I also believe it is important to strengthen the other regular bodies and surveillance mechanisms of the organization, in particular the Committee on Trade and Development, which should continue to be the focal point and coordinator of all development related activities in WTO, including Regional Trade Agreement under Enabling Clause.

We regret that two members of this Organization continue to block consensus concerning the observer request of the League of Arab States.

This action undermines otherwise unanimous support for the request and is inconsistent with the WTO's rules and guidelines.

We hope that the two members would reconsider their position to allow all qualified IGOs to participate on the WTO's activities," she remarked.

The Arab States reaffirm the importance of the introduction of Arabic as an official language at the WTO to enhance the participation of their governments, business communities and civil societies in the multilateral trading system and in WTO.

The State of Kuwait supports the African and Arab proposal on WTO future work programme to mitigate the impact of the food market prices and volatility on Least Developed Countries and Net Food Importing Countries.

It also welcomes the Draft Decision on LDC Accessions and urges its adoption at this conference.

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