Ministers Arrive in Buenos Aires for High-Level WTO Meet

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The WTO’s biennial ministerial conference will kick off on Sunday 10 December in Buenos Aires, Argentina, setting in motion the global trade club’s highest-level meeting amid open questions over what the final negotiated outcomes might entail.

WTO ministerials usually conclude with some type of outcome document, normally a ministerial declaration, along with a series of associated decisions. While work had begun in Geneva to draft the planned ministerial declaration, that process was brought to a halt in late November following objections raised by the United States involving two sections that were being drafted for the declaration, those reaffirming the centrality of the multilateral trading system and the development dimension of the organisation’s work.

The 10-13 December meeting in the Argentine capital city follows several frenzied weeks of talks in Geneva, Switzerland, where the WTO has its headquarters, as members worked to ramp up their negotiating pace to facilitate a successful conference. Geneva negotiations would not be completed prior to Buenos Aires, and that ministers will take up these topics when the event begins and perhaps continue after the MC.

Geneva preparations conclude

Leaving Geneva, members were divided on a host of topics, ranging from how to frame the final outcome document, to what should feature in any decisions for ministers to adopt by consensus at the meeting’s close. 

As for the subject-specific negotiations, the final weeks of Geneva preparations have also seen members moving increasingly towards endorsing some interim outcomes now, and leaving additional work on these and other topics for a post-Buenos Aires work programme.

Talks among WTO members on disciplining harmful fisheries subsidies continued in Geneva until 6 December, at which point negotiators forwarded a draft decision for their ministers to continue working on in Buenos Aires. Those talks are held within the “rules negotiating group” at the global trade body.

The next section of the text outlines a series of alternatives for how to word an article addressing subsidies for IUU fishing, which is among the more developed of possible substantive commitments. The first alternative has members agreeing outright “not to grant or maintain subsidies that contribute” to IUU fishing, pending the adoption of a final agreement. The subsequent alternatives feature different formulations, some of which involve endeavouring to or agreeing to get rid of subsidies to IUU fishing “set out in paragraph 3” of the International Plan of Action to Prevent, Deter, and Eliminate Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated Fishing (IPOA-IUU), with different variations. One of these includes a provision that would exclude developing countries from commitments if they lack the necessary capacity, and implementing would then be contingent on receiving capacity-building or technical support.

A deal to discipline harmful fisheries subsidies had long been considered one of the potential big deliverables from this year’s ministerial, particularly in light of Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) target 14.6. This calls for finalising those disciplines and eliminating subsidies by IUU by 2020, while “recognising that appropriate and effective special and differential treatment for developing and least developed countries should be an integral part of the World Trade Organization fisheries subsidies negotiation.”

However, given technical difficulties and political challenges across various aspects of these talks, negotiators have lately moved towards clinching a limited deal now and a more comprehensive one later on.

Food Security – No Decision Expected

On agriculture, Kenyan Ambassador Stephen Karau, who chairs those negotiations, told members last week that the more likely areas for agreed outcomes would be public stockholding for food security purposes, building off an agreement reached four years ago by ministers when they met in Bali, as well as on export prohibitions and restrictions, and potentially cotton.

Geneva trade officials familiar with the talks say that an outcome on domestic support at the ministerial is growing less likely by the day, and instead may be one of the items to feature in a post-Buenos Aires work programme, along with other possible topics such as market access and export competition. Meanwhile, some members have circulated draft ministerial decisions on different agricultural topics.

This includes a submission from Russia on continuing domestic support talks post-MC11 and endeavouring to cut back on trade-distorting support, along with improving notifications, as well as a submission from Rwanda for the African Group on continuing domestic support negotiations. The latter also outlines some initial requirements for those discussions, such as how to address cuts in countries’ aggregate measure of support (AMS), along with curbing and eventually removing production-limiting “blue box” programmes” and set some rules on “green box” support, which is meant to be only minimally trade-distorting. 

Singapore has also put forward an updated proposal on transparency in export prohibitions or restrictions, addressing the notification of any new temporary measures involving “critical shortages of food stuffs,” along with stating that foodstuffs bought for humanitarian use under the World Food Programme must not face such prohibitions or restrictions, while calling for more work on this area.

Meanwhile, the Philippines has put forward its own proposal on a “partial outcome” for the special safeguard mechanism (SSM), which is a tool for addressing import surges and price falls, setting out a price-based SSM to be agreed in Buenos Aires and committing members to negotiate a volume-based one thereafter.

Other proposals have emerged on a range of topics, including draft decisions by groups of members, along with statements or questions from individual members and negotiating coalitions. These cover a wide array of topics, including investment facilitation, a proposed work programme on micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises, domestic regulation in services, the e-commerce work programme, and special and differential treatment, often reflecting known positions of different member groups.

The days ahead – No Green Room

The opening ceremony of the ministerial to begin at 4 PM local time on 10 December, with official negotiating work to begin the following day with the start of high-level plenaries. Designated “minister-facilitators” will also convene meetings on Monday on specific subject areas – e-commerce, development, agriculture, fisheries, and services/non-agricultural market access – to support the Buenos Aires process, working with the negotiating chairs. These meetings will be held back-to-back so all members can attend. Each full working day will close with a meeting of “heads of delegation,” and Azevêdo has confirmed that there will not be any closed-door, “green room” sessions, though he may hold consultations with members.

The speaking order for plenaries has many major players due to make their high-level statements on the first full day of work, 11 December. The list of speakers for that morning includes the US, the EU, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, and India, among others.

US Sceptic

One open question for many members will be how US officials approach the WTO ministerial deliberations, given their muted engagement and repeated statements of “scepticism” during the negotiations in Geneva, as well as their move to block the drafting process of the ministerial declaration. The US has instead expressed interest in discussing “institutional reforms” to the global trade club.

Meetings in the margins – Bilaterals and Multilaterals

While the WTO ministerial conference and related negotiations are the main event, these high-level meetings have traditionally afforded ministers the chance to meet on the margins and make progress on other bilateral, regional, or plurilateral priorities.

In parallel to the ministerial conference, joint ministerial declarations from groups of WTO members are expected on trade and women’s economic empowerment, as well as on fossil fuel subsidy reform. Additionally, ministers from the European Union and the four Mercosur countries are slated to meet in the hopes of announcing a political deal in their trade negotiations, now nearly two decades old.