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Good morning.
It gives me great pleasure to welcome you all
to this inaugural conference of the TAIT programme. TAIT stands for
Thinking Ahead on International Trade and this is a four-year research
programme run by the Graduate Institute's Centre for Trade and Economic
Integration. We at the Secretariat are pleased to be a co-organizer of
this meeting and to host it here in the WTO premises. This inaugural
conference is built around five thematic sessions over the next day and
a half.
I am pleased to encourage those who think and
write about the multilateral trading system and its future to undertake
this kind of work. Although, I must say, judging by the dozens of
studies and conferences about how to reform the WTO, I am not sure my
encouragement is entirely necessary!
The quest to “fix” the WTO has become a highly
popular pursuit. I say this only semi-seriously. I am acutely aware of
the formidable challenges facing the multilateral trading system, and of
our shared interest in addressing them.
In considering the WTO and its future, I think
we can make a useful distinction in terms of two strands of concern.
First, there are the challenges we face in addressing upcoming issues,
changing realities in the international economy, and new imperatives for
rule-making among nations. These, if you like, are the exogenous or
external forces we are required to respond to if the institution is to
remain strong and relevant. These are matters whose emergence we cannot
control, but in respect of which we can exert a constructive influence
if we manage international cooperation effectively.
The second locus of interest relates to the
institution of the WTO and how it goes about its business. It is about
all the processes and procedures that constitute our working methods.
I do not for a moment doubt that the WTO, like
any other organisation, has plenty of room for improvement, and in many
domains. But neither have we stood still as an organisation. We have
experienced significant, if often gradual, change in many of the ways we
do business. This process is likely to continue for as long as
governments attribute value to the institution.
Successful adaptation in an institution like
this, it seems to me, requires incremental, evolutionary change. Those
enthusiasts for dramatic reform, for going back to the drawing board,
sometimes give the impression of being more enamoured of the elegance of
their brave new designs than the practicality of what they suggest. As I
said in my statement to the WTO membership last April when I was a
candidate for a next term as WTO Director-General — and I quote — “In
conclusion, no major surgery is needed in the WTO. No major overhaul of
the system is required. But rather, a long to-do list to strengthen the
global trading system.”
I am pleased to see that this conference
focuses both on one or two of the external challenges facing the
multilateral trading system in the future, and on considerations
relating to how business is done in the WTO.
My first cursory look at what the organizers
have produced by way of background documentation for the five round
tables suggests that none of you are aspiring revolutionaries. Rather,
you are incrementalists. This makes your efforts more interesting and
relevant, and raises the likelihood that decision-makers might pay
attention to what you have to say.
The first round table in this conference asks
the very pertinent question of why governments choose different venues
for international cooperation on trade matters. This is an issue that
has been with us for a long time, as preferential trade agreements have
multiplied. It has not been all bad, but we need to think about
strengthening synergies and avoiding the divisiveness that multiple
overlapping trade agreements can generate. This means clarifying the
case for the centrality of a global approach to trade relations in an
increasingly complex and interdependent world.
The second round table takes up a set of
emerging issues relating to food, agricultural products and natural
resources in the world economy. These are not exactly new issues, but
they pose growing challenges in relation to effective international
disciplines. A range of specific questions emerge, ranging from the
scope and content of the trade rules to the role of standards in
agricultural trade.
The third panel addresses a key emerging
issue, that of international cooperation in dealing with climate change.
This issue is now central to discussions on international cooperation
and the search for viable solutions will tax the ingenuity and
cooperative spirit of governments. Trade is relevant, but in my view not
the core of what needs to be done now.
The fourth panel looks at how the WTO can
contribute to maintaining open trade in time of economic crisis, like
the present. The WTO clearly has a role, but we need to understand
clearly what that role is, both in stemming protectionism and
contributing to the exit from crisis. The WTO may be greater than the
sum of its parts, but it cannot work effectively with the commitment and
clear-headedness of its parts — that is, the governments that constitute
its members.
Finally, the fifth panel looks at
decision-making in the WTO. We have relied greatly on consensus
decision-making in the WTO and will doubtless continue to do so.
Nevertheless, the paper looks at other ways of taking decisions that
could have advantages for the effective functioning of the trading
system, so long as any possible, controlled departures from consensus
fully protect all the rights of the entire membership. This is a
challenging issue, and personally I believe the onus is on those who
propose changes to consensus to demonstrate the advantages of such
changes.
I look forward to hearing how the
deliberations of the next day and a half progress, and I am pleased to
see that a range of government officials, scholars and business people
have been invited to participate in the deliberations.
Before I end, however, there is an important
point that I wish to emphasize. We cannot discuss change and the
challenges of the future in isolation from full cognizance of the
present. We cannot simply look ahead and set aside what we have on our
plates today. The viability of the multilateral trading system, the
order and predictability that underwrites it, and the economic prospects
of countries around the world, depend on our ability to finish what we
started at in the closing months of 2001 — the Doha Round. We have been
close, and I believe we are close enough, and sufficiently like-minded,
to make closure possible. But we shall have to do some more hard work,
and close the remaining gaps.
None of the difficulties that this Round has
faced and overcome, none of the few difficulties that still remain to be
addressed is, in my view, of a structural nature. It boils down to good
old domestic politics.
I am confident that WTO members can do it, and
I am even more convinced that we cannot afford the luxury of letting the
negotiations languish into the indefinite future, which is why leaders
have given to their negotiators the 2010 target.
This is the reality: we need to complete
today's agenda if we are to even begin to look credible in addressing
tomorrow's, which I agree with you, will have to be done sooner rather
than later. I hope that you will keep this idea in the back of your
minds as you talk about the future.
Thank you very much.
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