Group Calls On WTO Members To Make Trade Rules Development Compatible

A group of civil society organisations is calling for endorsements of a letter to the World Trade Organization prior to the upcoming Ministerial meeting in December aimed at preventing alleged efforts by rich countries to tighten international trade rules and introduce corporate “wish-list” issues from free trade agreements into the WTO.

The Our World Is Not For Sale letter is urging WTO members to “take seriously the need for the upcoming Nairobi Ministerial to change existing WTO rules to make the global trading system more compatible with people-centered development, and to forestall efforts by some developed countries to abandon the development agenda and replace it with a set of so-called ‘new issues.’”

In particular, the letter refers to a 2013 Turnaround Statement encompassing proposals from civil society groups. This year, the letter says, “a group of 90 (G90) developing countries made concrete proposals for changes to existing WTO rules that would remove some WTO constraints on national pro-development policies.”

The G90 group includes: the African Group; the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States; Least-Developed Countries; as well as countries that are not WTO members and some which are WTO observers, according to the WTO.

The letter also warns against dividing developing countries and treating emerging markets “as if they were already developed.”

“This approach has no basis in WTO law, in development policy, nor in economic reality,” the letter says.