Alan Kyerematen, the Minister of Trade and Industry, has urged for reforms to the World Trade Organization (WTO) to improve its efficiency.
"It is indeed a matter of great concern to some of us who have been in and out of these Ministerial meetings over the last 20 years that we are still being confronted with the same issues that have been tabled before us over two decades," he said in a statement at the plenary session of the World Trade Organization's twelfth ministerial conference, which opened on June 12 in Geneva, Switzerland," adding that "this clearly points to the need for serious structural rethinking."
The Ministerial Conference is the WTO's highest decision-making body, and it meets once a year. a period of two years It gathers all WTO members, which are all nations or customs unions, together to make decisions on all issues relating to multilateral trade agreements.
"As members, we will need to examine the negotiating architecture critically." Ministerial conferences aren't meant to be a continuation of discussions, which are the job of our technical teams, according to Mr Kerematen.
He stated that the Ministerial Conference will require the combined power of WTO members to restore optimism and faith in the multilateral trade system.
"When we assemble as Ministers at these conferences, we do it in order to make tangible choices." "As a result, I would like to urge to you, my colleague Ministers, to rise above our individual country's interests and permit flexibilities that would unlock otherwise tough negotiation situations," Mr Kyerematen added.
He stated that the WTO Secretariat must engage in extensive political engagements with member states' capitals in the interim between Ministerial Conferences to ensure that matters to be addressed in Ministerial meetings have the support of the political leadership of member states before they convene at the Ministerial Conference.
The debilitating impact of the idea of single endeavor for a major organization like the WTO, according to Mr Kyerematen, is that it necessitates greater contemplation for a diversified membership and many areas of interest.
"Leaving this Conference without attaining clear solutions that can cement the aspirations of developing and least developed nations in leveraging trade to help reboot their economies will be a tragedy of history," he added.
He proposed that the Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) Council grant a waiver to enable Members to produce vaccines, diagnostics, and therapeutics for developing and least developing-country members in order to alleviate their suffering and speed up the global recovery process.
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